#Erik Hell

[dare-g]

The Rite (1969)

[letterboxd-loggd]

The Passion of Anna (En passion) (1969) Ingmar Bergman

July 4th 2023

[motionpicturelover]

"Riten" (1969) - Ingmar Bergman

(Eng. title: "The Rite")

Films I've watched in 2024 (8/?)

[fourorfivemovements]

Films Watched in 2023: 66. En Passion/The Passion of Anna (1969) - Dir. Ingmar Bergman

[ornithorynquerouge]

Emily Agnes / Emily Shaw by Erik Tranberg

[siderains]

magneto manspreading and covering charles mouth with steel while demanding him to shut up??? oh my god get a ROOM

[bigalockwood]

I’ve seen some people say that we don’t know the full truth about Erik and shouldn’t judge too harshly. And while that is true- we’ll never get the full story, because we’d need Erik to be alive and willing to give to us- it doesn’t really matter, not for Wille. Because, yes, he’s worried that Erik may have been homophobic, but his rosy picture of his brother is shattered either way. Because if Erik had been the perfect Crown Prince and person, he would’ve stood up for the first years, whether the whole initiation was his idea or not. Wille always saw Erik as brave and someone who protected him and others. That ideal is destroyed, regardless of which role Erik played in the initiation. He was someone who could’ve pulled rank (and lbr he was a third year, crown prince and popular- he definitely had more sway than anyone else) but let it all happen and participated in it.

And that’s something he never would’ve expected from him.

[lordbucketofthecaribbean]

X-Men people how are we doing

I personally am not ok.

[nessie665]

You know I hate to say it, I told you so

You know I hate to say it but, I told you so

[thevulturesquadron]

“Hands are unbearably beautiful. They hold on to things. They let things go.” [Mary Ruefle]

[green--tea-owo]

things i could talk about for HOURS:

[insomniphic]

Ney’s Narry cosplaying as the Viscount in Phantom of the Opera?

Sure why not :P

(@braisedhoney)

[metal-sludge]

WARRANT (1984 - present) | Cherry Pie promotional ad in RAW, November 1990.

[bonesandpoemsandflowers]

my bohemian ass woke up at noon on a friday so I'm not firing on all cylinders yet, but there is this important distinction in the novel, The Phantom of the Opera, and the musical The Phantom of the Opera. I understand why a novel length distinction is cut for time and narrative tidiness for a medium that happens on stage, but I think people draw some very unfair, unflattering and incorrect conclusions from the stage that they port into their reading of the novel.

that is: Erik, the phantom of the opera, knows about Christine and Raoul's engagement and he's actually totally cool with Christine's plan. This is not incel behavior. This is not ~toxic masculinity~ or whatever contemporary bullshit you want to spew on the intentionally sympathetic monster in gothic literature. Raoul is supposed to leave on a naval expedition to the north pole. Christine's plan is to be engaged with him until he leaves. "This is a happiness that will hurt no one," she says. I don't have the exact quote for it but later on she relates how Erik knows and approves, at least of this intended to be limited engagement engagement. Why? Because he's the happiest of men with Christine, and he wants Raoul to experience that happiness. He does also expect Raoul to, you know, fucking leave when he's supposed to, but still. Christine and Raoul are romping around the Opera, kissing and crying together, and our ghost dude here is just like: good for them.

What sets him off is not the idea of a romantic rival. He does not, imo, feel "entitled" to Christine's love or whatever batshit nonsense the Erik-as-incel narrative huffs like paint fumes. What sets Erik off is how Christine has lied to him: not about the engagement, but about the degree of visceral disgust she feels for Erik specifically as a result of his deformity. She details, in graphic detail, how she closes her eyes instead of looking upon him, how she tells him that she only averts her eyes because she is in awe of his genius. She tells Raoul how horrible even physical proximity to Erik is, how grotesque his face is, how the horror of an animated corpse proclaiming his love to her is--well, horrible, and horrifying. Erik is on the floor, on his knees, kissing the hem of her dress, and Christine has her eyes closed the whole time.

I also think contemporary audiences can't handle that. They need Christine to be a pure and wholesome Good Girl (regressive bullshit), who is the victim of an evil evil man, and only the victim (also regressive bullshit). But also because she is a female character in the contemporary mind, she is allowed no flaws. She must reject Erik because he is a bad man. It would be ableist otherwise, yes? And the contemporary audience cannot handle lack of physical beauty being the reason. There can be no nuance to Christine's reactions. She is Good. Erik is Bad. That's all there is to it. The audience member is so sure that they themselves are above moral reproach, too. That's what is at stake here, also.

Never mind that Christine herself, repeatedly, notes that Erik is right when he says that if she thought he was handsome, she would stay. Never mind that when Raoul asks her if she would still love him if Erik were handsome, Christine declines to reply.

To be clear: this is not a Christine bashing post. I think her complexity here is fascinating. I hate a flat one note ingénue and that's not what she IS, and it pains me that fic authors write her that way, as if it's superior. No! Here she's human and she's magnificent! She's conflicted! Erik is alluring but also in ways that are no fault of his own, terrifying.

We gloss over the intended body horror of the novel. I know I do. I forget that he smells like rot and death, that he's cold and clammy to the touch, that he moans like a ghoul, that is supposed to have a gaping nose hole and eyes you can only see in the dark.

I don't think Christine is wrong to lie. But it's easy to understand, if you let yourself, how betrayed the monster might feel when he finds out about all this concealed disgust.

So, two points here

The rage upon being unmasked isn't just because he's unmasked and she broke a rule or whatever. It's the death of his whole gambit and his last hope, and Erik is, canonically, very smart. He knows this. He knows his face IS the issue. He knows it is THE issue. He reads Christine correctly in that the Angel of Music bit is ultimately forgivable in her eyes, and she likes that he brought down her favorite horse, she absolutely is there for their shared spiritual musical raptures. I want people to understand this: ERIK IS RIGHT about his own situation, a LOT of the time. He comes to some bad conclusions after, but in terms of understanding what's happening around him, he's accurate.

And so the rage and despair post Apollo's Lyre isn't "oh no, she loves Raoul," or even "how dare she, that SLUT," as some people make it out to be. It's the realization that he's been a monster to her this whole time. All this time he thought that she saw him as a man, and she has not. All the presumably good memories he has of her and her two weeks she lived with him are now revealed as lies. She's been enduring this whole time, not acclimating. She feels horror. She feels, again, disgust. She's shuddered at the touch of his hand in hers and put on a brave face and he's believed her up until this point, and he's having his physical inadequacies and his uncharacteristic naiveté described in excruciating detail to his romantic rival. He probably feels real fuckin stupid, on top of all else. He's been duped. He also feels disgusting and unlovable, because Christine has just repeatedly described him as disgusting and unlovable.

It is, of course, wildly incorrect to then decide to blow up an opera house about it.

But it's not entitled incel behavior and that's such a boring and contemporary narrative to shove a beautiful example of gothic literature into. Intellectually lazy and artistically myopic. I think most of us, if we're honest with ourselves, can think of a time we thought somebody liked us--maybe romantically or sexually but also maybe not, maybe just as a friend, as a bestie--and we turned out to be very wrong, because the person was just being polite or avoiding awkwardness or whatever. That is: they lied, in a very understandable and justifiable and socially expected way. And how did that feel, dear reader? Not great, right?

The point of the phantom of the opera is that it's a bunch of normal human experiences turned up to the max, dialed into a sublime hum that goes so hard it turns inhuman and terrible. It's that what makes a monster, what makes a man line, which is only interesting to walk if it's identifiably very human in parts. So Erik isn't just romantically rejected: he is rejected in just about EVERY way possible, besides his divinity of music. And this is supposed to the story of his entire life, over and over again, just most vividly and poignantly illustrated by his failure with Christine, when he most desperately wants to be just like everybody else.

And I think it's a shame to lose that very basic narrative and thematic point, but also a shame to lose the nuance of: Erik wants to share his happiness with Raoul. He loves Christine so, so much that he seems to find Raoul's lovesick desire very relatable. Of course, who wouldn't allow his fellow man a glimpse of heaven? And I just chose my words carefully there, if not the rest of the post. In his approval of Christine and Raoul's playful engagement, Erik is briefly engaging on a man-to-man level. He feels human about it. And when he feels human and accepted as human, instead of a walking horror show, he's immediately kind of gracious.

It's when he finds out that he's been a monster and not a man this whole time, in the eyes of his beloved and his rival, that he seems to go: I'll show you what a monster is.

[soup-scope]

we finally got canon ages for some of the redacted boys!!!

Samuel Collins- 29 *when turned* (technically 44 ig)

Vincent Solaire - 20 *when turned* (technically 43 ig)

Avior- Coalesced 36 years ago

Gavin- Coalesced 33 years ago

Aaron- 33 years old

David Shaw- 30 years old

Asher Talbot- 30 years old

Milo Greer- 30 years old

Lasko Moore- 29 years old

Elliot- 29 years old(???) (timeline just states he was adopted 29 years ago)

Huxley- 26

Caelum- Coalesced 24 years ago (caelum is still very much mentally a child tho. don’t be weird)

Damien- 24 years old

[movietimegirl]

Morph: Someone's daddy didn't get pony on for his sweet 16th.

Magneto: My parents perished when I was a child...

Morph, Magneto is a holocaust survivor...