#and the complete lack of discussion of Louis

[heliza24]

Consent and Abuse in The Vampire Chronicles (and how it explains things like Daniel and Louis's disappearances)

TW: discussions of abuse, sexual abuse and rape, and CSA throughout this meta.

I’ve now read the first six Vampire Chronicles books, and I want to talk about the role that consent, or more importantly, the lack thereof, plays in the morality the books espouse. When I was a few books in, I discovered this post by @diasdelasombra, which uses excerpts from several scholarly texts to create a schema that helps us understand who Anne Rice considered a “worthy” victim of abuse. To summarize, the characters that Anne favors and who are featured in the narrative were violated against their will, but don’t whine about their misfortune. Instead they extend grace and forgiveness to their abuser. (Think of David or Lestat) The characters who are portrayed as conniving, wicked, or who are punished by the narrative are those who don’t adequately protest their assault, or who harbor anger or plans of revenge towards their abuser (think of Claudia).

When I say abuse here, I am specifically talking about sexual abuse and rape, but also being turned into a vampire against your will. Being bitten by a vampire is obviously sexually coded, and being transformed into a fledgling vampire nonconsensually is a metaphor for a rape. So I’m going to spend this meta talking about nonconsensual turnings interchangeably with rape.

When I read about the dichotomy of victimhood detailed in the original post, the books suddenly shifted in my mind, and I felt like I understood Anne as a writer for the first time. I love these books and their resulting adaptations, but I do believe that Anne had many flawed beliefs, and this insistence that the only proper response to assault is complete and total forgiveness of the perpetrator is certainly one of them. I want to take the theory put forward by the original post one step further, and propose that in addition to imperfect victims, Anne also struggled to write about characters that engaged in sex/vampirism consensually. This feels very Catholic to me; you’re allowed to enjoy sex, but only if you didn’t ask for it. It’s the lust and the longing that’s sinful. It’s this discomfort with consensual desire, along with the insistence that victims must forgive their abusers, that is at the heart of many of the most frustrating aspects of the Vampire Chronicles. It also drives some of the conflict I see in the fandom, and has the potential to impact the TV adaptation in interesting ways. I talk about all of that in detail below the cut:

We can see this central belief about abuse and worthy victims easily in the characters Anne chooses to feature. Lestat, David, and Marius were all turned against their will, but crucially do not linger, protest, or whine once the act is done. Lestat is incapable of holding any kind of grudge, Marius approaches vampirism and eternity with calm stoicism, and David immediately forgives Lestat for turning him against his will.

I think this is key when we try to understand why Anne wanted to replace Louis with David as a companion for Lestat. Louis’s turning is complicated; you get the sense that he did consent to it, even as he tells Daniel that he “can’t say that [he] decided” to become a vampire. And even though he does forgive Lestat at the end of IwtV, the telling of the story in that book is filled with resentment and anger. Louis is not a perfect bastion of forgiveness by any means. Anne talked about how she wanted to move on from the grief that Louis represented and also the passivity he embodies as a character (which she classifies as uniquely feminine, which adds another dimension of meaning to who is allowed to consent to sexual acts and remain angry at abuse) but I also have to assume that she wanted to move on from his anger. Which is actually a huge disservice to Louis, Lestat, and the complexity of the narrative.

The other characters who are turned consensually are all abandoned by the narrative. Madeleine is killed, Gabrielle largely disappears after TVL, Nicki kills himself, and Daniel goes mad and is then simply forgotten.

My love of Daniel is the reason why I started stringing this theory together. Daniel is the most clear-cut case in the entire chronicles of a consenting adult who deeply desires to become a vampire. He has no reservations, no resistance. The Devil’s Minion chapter is unique in that it lingers on Daniel's love and desire. Daniel is briefly allowed to want something unabashedly that is also coded as sinful and evil. And once the consummation of his desire happens, Anne simply doesn’t know how to continue to writing him. Armand’s insistence that fledglings will come to hate their makers seems in some ways to be a result of Anne’s worldview, that desire cannot cannot endure unpunished, rather than something Armand would believe in-universe (he never hated Marius, after all). When fans rail at the way Daniel’s story seems to disappear from the page, this is what we are protesting: Daniel’s desire deserved to be shown, Daniel deserved to evolve, and Daniel’s willingness does not require rebuke.

There is of course another interpretation of the Devil’s Minion chapter, which is that it is Armand playing out his and Marius’s relationship, but this time with Armand in control. In some ways I think the Devil’s Minion chapter is the one successful attempt Anne makes to subvert the cycle of abuse. Yes, Armand is re-enacting many of the things done to him, but Daniel is happy to do this role play with him, at least for a while. While far from perfect, their relationship manages to turn abusive history into present day kink, and exist in a context of mutual care.

Armand himself is probably the most interesting edge case in terms of Anne’s dichotomy of worthy and unworthy victims. He asks to be turned into a vampire, but he’s also a child, which makes his ability to consent unclear. (Whether Anne even believed that child sexual abuse was possible at all is up for debate; she wrote a message on her “fan voice mail” that is still transcribed on her website that defends a convicted pedophile and seems to argue that 14 and 15 year olds are effectively adults and therefore cannot be abused. Yikes yikes yikes.) This kind of uncertainty seems to be reflected in the changing way Anne writes Armand throughout the series. He’s evil at first in the same way that Claudia is evil; a conniving forever child who is smart and vicious enough that what was done to him can be justified. But Anne softened on Armand after Queen of the Damned. As the series goes on, Armand comes to resemble Anne’s perfect victim more and more. He forgives Marius relatively quickly, for instance, for turning Benji and Sybelle without his consent.

For Marius (and Lestat) overcoming victim status also means becoming the abuser, the rapist, the perpetrator of the dark trick. The only way to not be trapped under the cycle of abuse is to perpetrate it. Even though it is hidden in a lot of language about love and forgiveness, this theme is ever present in the Chronicles and to me it’s where the true horror of the books lies.

We see these values begin to be applied to world building and the book’s overarching philosophy more and more as the series progresses. Akasha is the big bad in Queen of the Damned because she represents the ultimate lack of forgiveness. She is angry at all the men in the world for their collective abuses (a world view that seems to originate at least partially from the overly protective and restrictive way Enkil treats her, in my opinion) and seeks to kill them. She is an unquestioned evil, in a way that most characters aren’t in The Chronicles. And Maharet and Mekare, who are much more forgiving towards Khayman, one of the perpetrators of their own rape, are the ones able to defeat Akasha. Forgiveness and grace trumps righteous anger every time.

Memnoch the Devil is an interesting book (even if it is not a *good* one, imo) because it spends its pages interrogating this idea of abuse and forgiveness, but blows it up to a theological scale. Memnoch’s main argument with God is that he lets humans suffer needlessly. Memnoch feels that all that is good and holy amongst humans can be found in the way we love each other and find joy in sex, art, food, and celebration. But God requires humans to suffer through disease and death, and sometimes even violence brought about by religion. When Memnoch is put in charge of hell, he makes souls worthy of heaven by working on them until they are ready to forgive God for the suffering they had to endure during life. That’s what makes you worthy of heaven: forgiveness. I find this so interesting because it almost feels like Anne is arguing with herself over philosophy and religion. Memnoch is very convincing and his belief that joy without guilt is good is given due weight by the narrative. In some ways it’s what these books are about- sensual pleasure without guilt. But on the other hand, Memnoch is the devil (if that- Lestat is never quite sure if he’s really the devil or just a malignant spirit) which means we shouldn’t trust what he says. The idea of God as the ultimate abuser— the person who puts humanity through unspeakable horrors on a wide scale, and then requires our forgiveness in order to find peace— really chimes with the way that Anne writes about abuse in the rest of the series. According to this view, the cycle of abuse is absolutely inescapable. It is decreed by the almighty, and the only way to not be completely crushed by it is to accept its omnipresence and embrace its perpetrators without anger.

This focus on forgiveness is clearly a huge part of Anne’s (and therefore the vampires’) worldview, and I of course find that pretty problematic. But I also think it hurts the reader’s ability to connect to the characters and can have the unfortunate side effect of draining the books of the conflict needed to create a propulsive plot. The vampires’ inclination to completely forgive those who have wronged them, and to not linger at all in any feelings of anger, grief, or resentment, sometimes leads to baffling situations where conflicts that loom large in one book are completely forgotten in the next. The most jarring example of this to me is Armand casually playing chess with Santino in Queen of the Damned. Santino! The vampire who kidnapped him, forced him to eat his best friend, and generally tortured him. And they simply never address this. They just start playing a casual game of chess on Night Island after Akasha has been defeated. Situations like this can make character seem like they are acting completely out of character, and it makes it hard to understand their motives. Yes, there’s the in-universe explanation that time heals all wounds and eventually vampires just live long enough that they can’t hold any grudges. But I still think it’s reasonable to assume that Armand would hesitate before casually engaging with Santino again, no matter how long has passed. This kind of automatic forgiveness also means that we skip over so many conflicts that that would be fascinating to read about. If Armand and Santino really do need to reconcile, I want to see what that looks like. I want to see Armand remember Ricardo when he looks at Santino. I want to see what David and Lestat mending their relationship after Lestat’s violation looks like. But we don’t get any of that and instead the vampires move seamlessly on to something else, which is often much less interesting than these interpersonal conflicts that Anne ignores. And because of that, I think this focus on forgiveness creates books that are less fulfilling than they could be.

I think this focus on forgiveness is also at the heart of some of the conflict I see between book readers and show-only fans. I often see book readers talking about how Armand and Louis come back to each other later in the books, that Louis forgives Armand enough to live with him again for a time. And this makes sense in a book universe that prioritizes forgiveness above all else. In fact it actually signifies positive character growth for Louis, as it means he is becoming closer to Anne’s definition of a worthy victim who can forgive those who wronged him.

Fans of the show insist that the TV version of Louis will never forgive Armand, and for all I know they might be right. The TV show has shown that it’s very capable of taking the events and themes that Anne presented and reframing them. The show is already presenting a more critical depiction of CSA, in my opinion, by doing things like eliminating the incest subtext between Louis and Claudia and making it clear that Marius groomed Armand. I also think the show does a better job of keeping emotional stakes consistent. Louis may forgive Armand, but something more substantial than time passing will have to happen to facilitate that in the TV show. So show Louis may indeed never forgive Armand, given those new parameters.

In its efforts to reframe some of Anne’s themes, I believe the television show is shifting the emphasis on forgiveness slightly. Louis’s arc over the first two seasons depends on him reaching a state of forgiveness, not for an abuser, but for himself. He extends grace to Lestat as part of this process, but I really believe that the catharsis comes from Louis embracing his own failings and his own power, and moving forward with confidence. He has not forgotten his anger or the things that were taken from him, but he has the ability to face the rest of eternity now without self-recrimination. I imagine moving forward that this is going to be a major theme of the show. No matter if you sought vampirism out or had it thrust upon you, you must learn to how to deal with its horrors and its perks. You must learn to embrace your own monstrosity and not shrink from it. And you must find a way to accept the love that those around you are willing to offer, whether or not you always perfectly deserve it. I think these are lessons that Lestat, Armand, and even Daniel have yet to learn in the television show. Those character arcs are going to fuel the show through its coming seasons, and I for one cannot wait to see it unfold.

I’m interested to hear from other readers to see if they picked up on these themes, and how they anticipate the show will adapt them. Please tell me your thoughts! And thank you for reading this far.

[bosbas]

Chapter 14: honestly, who are we to fight the alchemy

series masterlist previous part || epilogue

pairing: colin bridgerton x enemy!fem!reader WC: 2.7k words

Warnings: period-typical gender roles, healthy amounts of pining, idiots in love!!, slow burn burning a little quicker now, some smooching

Summary: It took precisely two days in England for you to utterly despise Colin Bridgerton. It took him approximately twelve hours after that to hate you right back. But he doesn't care that you're the only person in the ton who doesn't like him. You're set to marry someone else anyway, right?

A/N: soooo bittersweet nearing the end of their story </3 sorry for my absence!! but i hope these two getting their lives together is worth it

August 6, 1816 – And finally, this author would have been remiss not to notice a certain Bridgerton’s lovesick behavior at the Worthington ball yesterday evening. And though I’m certain no one who attended the ball would be remotely surprised by this information, the members of the ton who did not can rest knowing that Colin Bridgerton seems to remain utterly captivated by Y/N Montclair.

The pair danced together twice despite not officially courting. This would be highly unusual if the look in Mr. Bridgerton’s eyes whenever he was near Lady Y/N was not a very familiar one. It seems that this season might not be a complete disaster for Lady Y/N after all, given that one man is still fighting for her hand. Whether or not she knows that Mr. Bridgerton feels this way remains to be seen.

“On y va,” said Louis, grabbing you by the arm and dragging you out the front door (Let’s go).

You blinked, surprised that the rest of your family was already piling into a carriage headed toward Bridgerton house. Heavens, you really needed to start paying attention.

The past few days– ever since your father told you Colin would be a suitable match, to be exact– you had been so deep in thought you’d barely managed to function. The possibility of marrying Colin Bridgerton, if he even wanted you, was a daunting one, and you had opted to devote hours of thought to this very notion.

In fact, your pondering had been so extensive that you hadn’t even managed to read Lady Whistledown. After a summer of religiously reading the gossip sheet, you had somehow missed the last two installments without even remembering to look for it at the breakfast table.

Hopping into the carriage alongside Louis, you mulled over the previous night’s ball. Colin had asked you to dance twice, which was highly unusual for two people in polite society who weren't courting. However, you reasoned that he probably was trying to compensate for all the time he spent being a nuisance. Besides, he was a great dancer, and you really didn’t mind.

Especially now that you were friends, it was exceedingly easy to spend time with him.

But did you love him?

The question lingered in your mind, unmoving and unrelenting.

Wouldn’t you know for sure if you did? Was your uncertainty indicative of something deeper? A fundamental lack of romantic feelings for Colin, perhaps? Your sister, Isabelle, and her husband were completely in love with one another, and you weren’t quite sure you felt the same way about the third Bridgerton.

---

As soon as you stepped through the garden door, your eyes immediately scanned the garden, searching for Colin. Finding him engaged in some sort of competition with Gregory and Benedict involving three Pall Mall balls and a fencing sword, you giggled to yourself as you started toward them.

“Y/N,” a hand on your arm interrupted your purposeful walk.

You turned to see Eloise’s excited face, and you couldn’t help but return the smile.

“Hello!” you greeted, kissing both of her cheeks as she dragged you toward a shadier spot.

As she launched into a lengthy explanation about her latest read, you listened to your friend intently. Of course, it had only been a few days since you’d last seen her, but the two of you always found something or other to discuss, and you found yourself in deep conversation with Eloise before you knew it.

What felt like a few minutes later, but was probably closer to an hour, you felt a tap on your shoulder.

“I didn’t know you were here,” said Colin, not sounding entirely happy with you. “I thought you would have come by and said hello by now,” he mumbled, eyes downcast.

You smiled fondly at his pouting face, unable to help yourself as you looked at this grown man completely worked up over the fact that Eloise had gotten to you first.

“That would be my fault,” laughed Eloise. “You don’t have a monopoly over Y/N, you know. But I fear I’ve talked her ear off already, so I’ll leave you to it.”

Colin rolled his eyes but bent down to kiss both of your cheeks anyway.

“It’s lovely to see you,” you said softly, eyes fixated on his long eyelashes fanning over his face. He really was very handsome, when you thought about it.

You had to physically clasp your hands together to keep from reaching out to him once he pulled back, and you scolded yourself for forgetting your manners. This was certainly not an appropriate way to act as an unmarried lady!

“You’re not upset with me, then?” asked Colin, looking you up and down.

You laughed. “Why would I be?”

“I dunno,” he said sheepishly, rubbing the back of his neck. “I suppose I was just used to it after so long, I don’t know what came over me.”

“Well, we’re friends now,” you reassured him. “So there’s no need to worry.”

“Right, friends,” Colin repeated after you, not entirely pleased with the way the words felt coming out of his mouth.

Suddenly, you heard a scream from across the garden, and a bright blue ball shooting in your direction. Turning around just in time to see Gregory’s horrified expression, you came face to face with what was certain to be a Pall Mall ball directly to the face.

But a strong pair of arms grabbed your waist and pulled you away. For a moment you couldn’t even comprehend what had just happened, and you were simply enjoying the feel of Colin’s arms around you as he hugged you tight to him.

Realizing that he had saved you from what would have most certainly been a black eye, you turned your head up to look at Colin. But he was already looking down at you, his grip still tight as he held you to his chest.

“Are you alright?” he asked, eyes not letting go of yours.

You nodded slowly, not trusting yourself to speak because you were so mesmerized by his eyes. He let out a sigh of relief, loosening his grip on you ever so slightly.

Hearing Gregory’s footsteps approaching, Colin quickly let go of you and cleared his throat awkwardly. But he couldn’t find it in himself to let you go completely, so he settled for leaving a hand on your waist, thumb rubbing up and down comfortingly.

Needing to keep feeling his touch, you raised one of your hands and reached across your waist, placing your hand softly over his and loosely interlocking your fingers.

“I’m so sorry!” yelled Gregory once he reached you. “I wasn’t looking and I swear I would have never hit you on purpose and-”

You laughed, cutting him off. “It’s quite alright, Gregory. Though I’m not certain your mother would agree,” you teased, nodding to where Violet was sitting, clearly furious at her son.

“Oh, no,” he groaned. “I’ve got to go save myself,” he said seriously, immediately taking off running across the garden and away from his mother.

You heard Colin laughing at Gregory’s antics next to you, and as you turned around to watch him with his head thrown back and a roguish smile on his face, you took in a sharp breath.

It might have been the sun shining through his hair, the mirth in his eyes, or the fact that he had just saved you from a very painful fate, but you felt like you were seeing him for the first time. You felt a tidal wave of realization so strong come over you that you had to take a step back.

“Oh,” you said softly, barely audible. Oh.

You loved Colin Bridgerton.

That’s what this feeling was. Feeling completely safe around him, so comfortable being yourself, and wanting more of him in any way possible. The need to feel his touch, the pull you felt toward him every time he was near you, and the desire to keep speaking with him for hours– it all made sense now.

You loved Colin Bridgerton.

Of course you did. It was frankly astounding that you hadn’t realized it sooner. But you couldn’t ruin the friendship you’d built with him over some silly feelings, could you?

Despite wanting to run into Colin’s arms, you knew you needed to get as far away from him as possible right then. So, you excused yourself to sit on a more secluded bench where you could think freely about the consequences of your realization.

---

It had been two hours since you had last spoken to Colin, and he was getting antsy.

Everything had been fine. Or at least that’s what he thought. Gregory had catapulted a ball directly at your head, and he had grabbed you and pulled you out of the way. And then refused to let go of you. All because he was too taken with you to remember how to act properly as a member of polite society.

Colin started pacing. You had probably figured out that he loved you. His behavior today had been a dead giveaway. There was simply no possibility of you still not knowing of his feelings for you, and Colin was three seconds away from losing his mind.

You had found out and now you were probably avoiding him, how dreadfully embarrassing. He needed to fix this now. Before your family went home and you never let him see you again.

Wringing his hands behind his back as he approached the bench you had been sitting on for the past two hours, Colin cleared his throat softly.

“Do you have a moment to speak?” he asked, overly formal as he navigated uncharted waters.

You nodded in response, gesturing toward the empty seat next to you. “I suppose we should,” you assented, the past few hours of nerves completely soothed by Colin’s presence.

“I very much appreciate our friendship as it is,” stated Colin. “And I really can’t apologize enough for my conduct earlier in the season.”

“Oh, Colin, that’s not-”

“No, no just let me finish. Otherwise, I won’t have the courage to get it out.”

Colin swallowed before continuing.

“I… I know that you want to marry a titled man and I know I don’t have a fortune. I am a third son with no talents and… and yet, I love you anyway. And I am so sorry. I promise I never meant for this to happen, but I love you. I do.”

You stared dumbly at him, butterflies erupting in your stomach as you realized that he had the same feelings for you as you did for him.

Admittedly, it was a bit entertaining watching him get all worked up over nothing, you mused. But it seemed like he was determined to keep speaking, so you only nodded as he continued.

“Y/N, you are all I think about, and all I picture as my future,” Colin said, eyes not quite reaching yours. “And I’ve never come across someone quite like you, who makes me feel the way you do. I know it’s horrible timing and it’s not at all my place to feel this way or to tell you. You must understand that I am so sorry, but I love you anyway.”

Then, lifting his worried eyes to meet yours, he started reaching for your hand, stopping himself before his fingers touched yours. “I hope you can forgive me because I would be more than happy to attend your wedding and see your dreams realized. But, believe me. I’ve tried, and I can’t help it. Not with you.”

“Colin,” you whispered, hand reaching out to touch his cheek.

He shook his head in response and closed his eyes, clearly pained by the thought of seeing you with anyone else.

“You can send me away if you like,” Colin assured you. “If you tell me to never speak to you again, I will. I’m so sorry. I just needed you to hear it from me.”

“Colin,” you repeated this time a bit more forcefully.

His eyes shot open, and he furrowed his brows at your smiling face. “Yes?”

You giggled. “I think I’d like to kiss you now.”

“What?” he said, dumbfounded.

“I’d like to kiss you now if that’s alright with you,” you said, biting your lip as you held back a laugh.

Colin took a second to process what you had just said. You nodded at him, confirming that you did, in fact, want to kiss him, and his face broke out into the biggest smile you’d ever seen on his face.

Placing a hand on your cheek, he fluttered his eyes closed and put his lips on yours. You brought a hand behind his neck and pulled him in closer, amazed at the feeling of finally kissing someone.

You rather suspected you had wanted this for a while, you thought, your lips moving in sync with Colin’s. How on earth you had managed to keep your hands to yourself before this you had no idea, but as the kiss deepened, you brought your hands to his shoulders and pulled Colin in, wanting to be as close to him as humanly possible.

Suddenly remembering why you were kissing in the first place, you pulled away from Colin, who whined softly as you leaned away from him, chasing your lips with his.

“I love you, too, you know,” you said, pecking Colin as he stared at you like you had personally hung every star in the sky.

Colin groaned under his breath, breathing deeply as he once again placed his lips on yours. “I love you,” he said between kisses, not ready to let you go long enough to say it properly. “So much.”

You smiled into the kiss, slipping your tongue into Colin’s mouth and tentatively exploring the new feeling. How you had ever lived without this was beyond you, but you supposed you had never really wanted this before you met him. Even at the beginning of the season, when you supposedly hated him, you could recall more than a few times you had felt this exact desire.

“I hope you don’t plan on defiling my daughter if you don’t intend to marry her,” came your father’s deep voice from behind you two.

Instantly separating from one another, you both coughed awkwardly and tried to disentangle yourselves.

“Marry her?” sputtered Colin, momentarily forgetting that your father had walked in on the two of you kissing a mere ten seconds ago. “I could do that? You would let me marry her?”

Your father laughed. “Even after that," he said, gesturing in Colin's general direction, "it would still be an honor to have you join our family.”

As you watched him walk away, Colin squeezed your hand, laughing gleefully. “Did you hear that? I get to marry you!”

“Were you not planning on marrying me after kissing me?” you scolded, tone only half accusatory.

“No, I mean– Well, I was just–” he rushed out, eyes searching yours frantically.

“It’s alright,” you laughed. “I was only joking.”

Colin let out a sigh of relief, kissing you firmly on the lips. “You never cease to vex me, woman.”

“Isn’t that what you like most about me?” you teased, biting down on his lip softly.

He groaned, unable to contain his desire for you. “We’d better get married tomorrow if you’re going to keep doing that.”

Then, separating himself from you slightly, Colin turned serious again. “You do want to marry me, don’t you? I know I obviously do, and your father said I have his permission, but do you want to?”

You bit your lip, full of affection for the boy who stole your heart. Even after kissing him and telling him you loved him, he still wanted to ensure that you wanted to marry him.

“I think we’d make a good pair, don’t you?” you said, nodding at him.

“I’ve thought that since the moment I saw you.”

“Well, we got there in the end didn’t we?”

“And I’d do it all again just to be able to marry you,” Colin assured you, kissing you on the nose.

—

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I no longer have a taglist for this fic, but turn on post notifications for @bosbas-library to stay updated when I post!

[userarmand]

every time I see your beautiful loumand gifs I get soooo mad at the complete lack of jassad interviews. how do you have them act out a complex layered scene like this and not get them to discuss it together:////

imagine adapting the back half of anne rice's interview with the vampire and not arranging even a singular joint interview with the actors who play louis and armand like not even a zoom call 💀

[beingpeople]

Anyway, I finally made clear that the cover was directly inspired by my work, The Nain Logs, in which my inspirations inspired me to produce a work of “literary fiction”, which in turn inspired me to produce a capstone piece, which you can still read, listen to, and view here:

To quote (spaces added to aid in comprehension):

“In the space delineated by these coordinates, the specific lines of interrogation that this book pursues are as follows. First, it eschews an empiricist and/or positivist method, even as it tries to hold the empirical and theoretical registers together. It is interpretative, building on the literary-aesthetic, especially poetry and film, as intuitive ways to access experience without relying on presuppositions that privilege either intentionality or consequentialism.

Second, it beings together different strands of political and social theorization in their anti-colonial, phenomenological, Marxist, post-structuralist, and feminist currents to elucidate those intuitions. It is ecumenical in relation to different strands; or said differently, it avoids a zealous fidelity to any one particular strand in a way that might foreclose engagement with and borrowings from others.

Furthermore, it also lacks fidelity to any single discipline but is instead transdisciplinary, learning from scholarship in political science, sociology, anthropology, political economy, and performance studies, among others.

Next, it is necessarily selective, with no pretensions to be exhaustive in the great variation in form, socioeconomic conditions of possibility, culture, and geographical location of actions under consideration, nor of the variety of theoretical paths of investigation.

Last, but not least, it is asymptotic, aiming to push past existing categories, concepts, methods, and approaches toward new theoretical questions without being able to settle them definitively. Indeed, it follows that insight that Louis Althusser once very perceptively expressed; namely, that ‘nothing in philosophy is radically new,’ ‘nor is anything ever settle definitively’”

- Dr. Banu Bargu, in the introduction to her book Disembodiment: Corporeal Politics of Radical Refusal, discussing the nature of the her study on the subject of self-directed violence and its place within a historicity of political agency, and which is completely unrelated to The Nain Logs, but is what I am currently reading and, thus, found to be an interesting and important passage for those looking to read her book.

[nalyra-dreaming]

I enjoy your blog and I’m not trying to be argumentative; just some friendly debate, but I notice you and Virginia both frequently reduce the entire Antoinette ordeal to Louis’ feeding habits and Lestat’s need for attention and adoration. Don’t you think Lestat had to have at least a little love for Antoinette? He had to love her on some level not to kill her right off the bat. This is apparent in the scene before Louis is playing cards before Doris tells him Jonah is there, Lestat is standing up close to the stage, completely entranced watching Antoinette perform like there is no one else in the room. Louis isn’t even present to make jealous. He slept with her and didn't kill her before Loustat was having serious problems like lack of intimacy. He stayed with her just as long as he stayed with Louis. I’m sorry, but I don’t think that man ever had any intention of being in a monogamous relationship.

Hey nonny!

(All good, you can be argumentative, as long as you're kind it's all fine, I just won't accept hate or insults anymore^^, hope that makes sense! Also, I really don't see that as argumentative^^)

I think @virginiaisforvampires and I just ... shorten the Antoinette discussion at times (by now) because it's been... a theme.

Like, the fandom latched onto the jealousy angle so massively, the asks wrt her were so numerous, the human cheating AUs on Ao3 so prevalent... the vampiric aspect seems to be often overlooked.

I think you're referring to my ask with the open relationship?

Because of course Antoinette was more.

(this is long, so the rest under the cut:)

She became more when he did not kill her as a feeding fling. (And I still stand by the fact that they must have had a lot of feeding flings, for example Louis is not really taken aback by soldiers in their bedroom - the same bedroom he gets so sharp about with Antoinette, which is another detail.)

So yes, Lestat apparently slept with her and didn't kill her. We don't get to see it, but it is insinuated.

But there is a lot more to Antoinette, and that is why some think she might show up again later. I am not sure if you're familiar with "the musician" from IWTV, "Antoine" from the later books?

Let me recap:

In IWTV we have the unnamed "musician". Louis never bothers to find out his name, even though it is clear that Lestat turns him. That unnamed musician then gets into the crossfire of Claudia's attempt on Lestat's life, and Louis... forgets about him. But he did know about him from the beginning:

"Lestat had a musician friend in the Rue Dumaine. We had seen him at a recital in the home of a Madame LeClair, who lived there also, which was at that time an extremely fashionable street; and this Madame LeClair, with whom Lestat was also occasionally amusing himself, had found the musician a room in another mansion nearby, where Lestat visited him often. I told you he played with his victims, made friends with them, seduced them into trusting and liking him, even loving him, before he killed. So he apparently played with this young boy, though it had gone on longer than any other such friendship I had ever observed." [..] "I could not tell whether he had actually become fond of a mortal in spite of himself or was simply moving towards a particularly grand betrayal and cruelty. Several times he’d indicated to Claudia and me that he was headed out to kill the boy directly, but he had not. And, of course, I never asked him what he felt because it wasn’t worth the great uproar my question would have produced. Lestat entranced with a mortal! He probably would have destroyed the parlor furniture in a rage."

(Interesting tidbit about the rage, which they picked up for the show!)

Louis even encounters Antoine, has a bit of a discussion with him after the initial attack on Lestat:

‘What is it?’ I asked him. ‘What did you need from him? I’m sure he would want me to...’ “ ‘He was my friend!’ He turned on me suddenly, his voice dropping with repressed outrage.

This last bit is important, for the later books, most importantly for "Prince Lestat", which we know Rolin takes from. Because in that book, in chapter 7, we find out what happened to "the musician", Antoine, after that fateful night, when Rue Royale burned (in the book).

Because Antoine did not burn to death (in the show, likely: Louis and Claudia did not know to scatter the ashes), and he survives, hideously burned, needing decades to heal. Lestat reunites with him before he chases after Louis and Claudia (to Europe).

When Antoine later tells of his own story, he says this:

“He was my friend, Lestat,” Antoine confessed. “He told me about his lover, Nicolas, who had been a violinist. He said he couldn’t speak his heart to his little family, to Louis or Claudia, that they would laugh at him. So he spoke his heart only to me.”

There is a LOT in that little paragraph. A lot that fits with what we know from the show, too.

Louis (in the show) tells of Lestat saying that "Antoinette fortifies him against them". Antoinette became more than a passing interest, a passing feeding fling, true, because Lestat can confide in her, can be himself with her, especially later, when things between him and Louis take on a strain. But he never leaves Louis, and I think that is often overlooked - (s)he was never a real threat to Louis, nor Claudia. Lestat left Antoine behind when he goes after them, to try to save them.

Louis on the show makes it seem as if Antoinette was that major threat. And the show (of course^^), sharpened that threat by making Antoine a woman, a white woman, whose very presence represented what Louis could not be in their relationship at the time, namely an official partner.

Louis uses the focus on Antoinette and what she represents to overshadow other things that coincide with the affair. He does the same later, when they are threatened, to shift the focus to Lestat's paranoia. It's clever, because it's built on truth, a "look at my right hand, not at my left" approach. But the real story is much more difficult than that.

And I think that goes for Antoine(tte) as well.

Since Rolin is specifically taking from "Prince Lestat" as well there is no way in hell he has somehow missed reading chapter 7, or has missed Antoine in the later books/chapters.

I for one wouldn't be surprised if she shows up at the trial - or in Dubai. Maybe she's that interior designer, who knows that Louis is missing the natural world....

I don't know. We'll see. But I doubt that the jealousy angle is all there is to it. There are too many discrepancies, even down to the make-up they used for her (which is its own meta). Lestat may have very well loved her, albeit differently than he loves Louis.

As for the monogamous relationship(s)...

Nonny, forgive me, but these are not humans. They are vampires.

They hunt, and kill humans, for food and pleasure. They play with their food, like other predators in our world do, too. They are also inherently hedonistic, looking for pleasure. (Maybe) Especially Lestat is trying to drown himself in the pleasurable things at times, for reasons that the show will still get to. Since the show explicitly added sex to the mix that desire is of course expressed in the hunt for pleasure, too.

But totally apart from "food", and sex... these vampires are a mess, relationship-wise.

When Lestat and Louis are "married" in the later books as Jacob calls it (I bet they'll make that literal in the show^^), that doesn't mean that they don't still love others. Have loved others. Will love others. They are beyond the need to narrow down their love though. And they are "official partners" then.

But it's... a knot of relationships and history.

Some of these people are truly immortal. Like, can not be killed anymore.

Imagine living with that fact (it maybe most famously sends Lestat reeling in "The tale of the Body Thief", for example).

Imagine loving with that fact. Imagine having the time.

[yesimwriting]

hello, i have a taboo question! what is your opinion on writers writing louis de pointe du lac as bisexual/pansexual for gender neutral/female romantic interests in fanfiction?

i've heard arguments that technically he is bi in the source material and even some people say "if you don't like don't read" but i feel like you might have an opinion on this since you have written platonic louis so well (love you for that there's a lack of louis x fem readers on the internet)

i feel like there are so many heavy/dark themes in fics that i have seen fly and be accepted on this site (don't get me started on dark romance and the romanization of r*pe) and even then people read what they wish to read and i just scroll past what i dont like.

Before I answer this question, I want to say that as a cis female I don't think anyone should consider my thoughts on this "law" or anything. This isn't a topic/discussion that impacts me or a character that represents my community, so just keep that in mind when reading my thoughts on this.

But I'm always willing to share an opinion, so please remember that this isn't me telling anyone what to do or what is or isn't okay <3 I'm just sharing an opinion.

Okay, moving past my disclaimer, I do think that there's a lot of nuance to this question. Personally, I don't see anything inherently wrong with people writing Louis as bi/pan for a gender neutral/fem reader. Mainly because there is source material evidence, but also some of my defense is coming from the fact that all fanfic writers are putting in so much effort/time/thought into producing free content because how much they love a specific work/fandom.

I also think people have grown a little too okay with bashing fanfic writers in general, and I'm not going to add onto that. I've been lucky in that the only comments/asks I've gotten on here have been supportive, but I've seen accounts I really love get some atrocious feedback.

I also think that because fanfics don't impact source material, and because no one is obligated to read every fic in order to participate in a fandom, we should all grow more comfortable with just scrolling past fics we don't like/don't relate to.

This might seem like a contradiction to what I just said, but I will say that while I've never written for Louis x gender neutral/fem reader romantically, I'm the kind of person that when I'm really into a fandom I'll read every fic I can find (unless I think I'll find the fic's material/content triggering or harmful to me obviously), and I've read some Louis x gender neutral/fem reader fics that I've really enjoyed.

Also, before I really started writing for iwtv, i did briefly think about writing a romantic fic for Louis x fem reader, but ultimately decided to put the idea on the back burner for a bit because the bestie reader idea came to me and I liked it a little more and I also didn't want to risk upsetting people lol. I love Louis in all ways though and now feel pretty settled in platonic Louis x reader, so it'll probably just stay an idea for awhile.

However, I do think that it's really important to accurately label/tag your fics so people know what to expect. If you're writing a gender neutral or fem reader, especially when creating fics for a character that's bi/pan, I think it's important to communicate that in the description/tags so that no one reading your fic stumbles onto content that could make them uncomfortable.

I also think that gender neutral fics deserve even more grace because, from my understanding, a primary goal of gender neutral fics is to avoid attaching any gender indicators onto the reader character so that those reading can align the fic with the gender identity they want to associate the fic with.

If you're firmly against Louis x gender neutral/fem reader, that's completely okay too! I don't mind discourse, but there is a real issue with people sending hate to fanfic writers, so as long as you're not commenting/messaging cruel things to someone whose putting so much time and energy into creating content for a fandom, I don't think anyone's opinion is fully wrong.

[cerullos]

not sure how exactly to articulate this but i do find it interesting that there are so many posts about how it shouldn't register as weird that claudia and madeleine are romantically involved because claudia is fully and completely an adult, and at points yes, i do get the sense that S2 of the show wants you to believe this but i would argue that, at the very least from rice's perspective, the tragedy of claudia is more complicated than this concept of an adult in a child's body. like, the reality is that we can't fully understand the extent to which claudia will or can develop toward "adulthood" (itself a malleable and culturally dependent concept) and that's the true horror of it, that's what makes siring a child vampire taboo among so many vampires, that's what louis so selfishly took from her!

and it does feel like S2 overextends itself in its desperation to convince the viewer claudia is in fact 100% developmentally matured and simply & only frustrated with her appearance and the limitations of her body. like...she is permanently pubescent!

not necessarily suggesting one approach or the other is "wrong" and obviously the show can reinterpret the text in any way it chooses, but i think the latter not only makes for a more compelling claudia arc but also asks some more interesting questions about the nature of human development, which is something rice has always been heavily concerned with.

the similarities between lestat and claudia are always a huge topic of discussion on here, and i think you do also feel that loss in light of the fully and "successfully" matured claudia of S2, who lacks the childish impulses, temper tantrums and mercurial nature of S1 claudia almost entirely. she endures louis's neglect and abuse with a level of grace that makes it kind of hard to suspend disbelief at points imo!

[pretty-weird-ideas]

Trauma Porn vs Representing Black Struggle in IWTV

TW: Domestic Violence (Focus) Rape (mentioned 1x)

Spoilers for the IWTV AMC Series

I think a lot of the distraught or incredibly positive reactions to Episode 5 of IWTV’s ending from black fans is because of the noticeable lack of genuine representation of black IPV let alone black queer people facing IPV at all. So not only was the scene without a trigger warning and absolutely out of nowhere (with of course the obvious foreshadowing and Lestat’s abusive behavior setting it up) but it was something that has barely been done for mainstream genre TV.

So as a black fan, seeing violence towards black people (trauma porn) is certainly not new to me... but seeing black queer people’s stories focus on IPV is something that I haven’t seen. It leaves me incredibly conflicted in ways that cannot be transcribed.

Genre TV, media in general, and even reality has an obsession with whitewashing (pun unintended) IPV towards black people unless it’s specifically meant to degrade us and utilize racist stereotypes. Rarely ever does IPV towards queer black people get spoken about in real life, let alone in fiction. So for a story to just be for real for a hot minute about that topic is both disturbing and jaw dropping.

I oscillate between “I can’t believe they would ever put this on TV” and “I’m so glad that they made this a plotline because nobody talks about this,”. IPV perpetrated by white people towards their black partners especially from a historical context is not talked about. And it certainly is not the focus of period pieces or literature as often as it should be.

This is even being taken away from us TODAY in history books; centuries of rape and domestic violence from the slave trade to Jim Crow is being censored RIGHT NOW. This is not isolated behavior.

And to see white IWTV fans sidestep this entirely back during the final stretch of season one to complain that having Lestat (who canonically abused Louis in other ways) assault Louis somehow ruined LESTAT’S character and THEIR SHIP. While completely sidestepping what themes they were intending and got across (you know like genuine media literacy) and the onscreen brutalization that happened without warning is disgusting.

Being able to cherry pick quotes and argue about whether or not slapping is “DV” is not only gross but it’s just not media literacy. That’s literacy... like good job bestie you can read! But it’s certainly doesn’t mean you have the range or comprehension to understand the intended themes of Episode 5 at all. And until white people begin to understand the nuances of being a black person being abused by a white person who holds power over you, it’s going to continue being out of reach.

It’s one thing to dislike it’s inclusion, because I also agree. But I’ve noticed that The Great Lestat Discourse TM has become the discussion rather than the perspective of how white supremacy aided in perpetuating domestic violence and the choice to show gory and unflinching physical abuse without a trigger warning.

White fans being disingenuous and asking Louis to fade into the background until Lestat (the white character) becomes the focus for TVL. While constantly mocking and ignoring the concept of IPV towards black people makes the point for me as to why this was an interesting and purposeful direction to head in. IPV is so ignored that when IWTV includes it, fans went out of their way to argue whether or not their favorite white boy would DARE TO DO THIS, and not why the writers did this and what they were attempting to say. IPV and queer victims of abuse are so ignored that after this happened people started making posts talking about APOLOGIZING TO A FICTIONAL LESTAT for writers “slandering” him! Discussions about abuse in interracial relationships during Jim Crow are so far ignored that people started to publicly doubt that actual domestic violence in interracial relationships existed at all! So badly that the writers had to come out and say that they wouldn’t make Louis “not the victim” when recontextualizing episode 5.

[dogsliampaynedoesntinstagram]

The Touring Data account on Twitter has posted updated numbers for Louis’ shows in Latin America, and it has caused a bit of fandom drama because the attendance was lower than expected. Some fans claim that the figures for the Mexico City show are wrong and the concert was attended by 67,000 people and that this has been confirmed by Louis’ team. I’m pretty sceptical about this claim because I haven’t seen any evidence of this apart from a few newspaper articles, and they seem to have relied on info from Louis fan update accounts. The Touring Data account itself also tends to be reliable because it just reports numbers from Pollstar.

Do you have any thoughts on this or about the figures in general? I’m no expert on touring but it seems to me like Louis’ team might have overestimated the size of the venues needed for some of the shows. But maybe it just makes more sense economically to play one show in a big venue rather than two shows in a smaller venue?

https://x.com/touringdata/status/1831090091294617979

I'm very glad that this sort of fandom drama only gets to me through anons. I really appreciate that you've explained so fully what's going on and linked to sources, because otherwise I'd be super lost.

My main thought is that current fandom treats worrying about this sort of thing as standard fandom practice. And it's not, or it doesn't have to be. I think its main function is to make fandom a more anxious experience - and I would strongly advocate for people turning their fandom towards the bits that bring them joy.

What that means is not talking about the data directly, but instead talking about the meta question of the meaning people are giving to the data. (If I was going to talk about the data directly it would be giving it meaning by comparing to what we knew about ticket sales at his last Latin American tour, but I don't care enough to try and do that).

I can come up with two explanations for why fans might give the questions of how many tickets are sold at a local venue so much weight - one is basically economics and the other is very fucked up ideas about validity.

There are two reason that you might be concerned about economics - one is concern for the artist (which I think it's good practice to try and not being too concerned about artist's financial position. They're wealthy and they're making money off other people's labour. If you want to be concerned about the finances of anyone involved, be concerned about the finances of people who make merch), and other is concern for whether or not they'll come back.

The problem is that fandom discussion is based on a complete lack of curiosity (that crosses over into willful ignorance) about how touring works. From the way fandom talked about it, you'd think an artist and their team selected and booked the venues in each case - took on all of the risk and got all of the reward. But that's only true of independent tours and most tours aren't independent. Promoters often offer a guarantee (that's the minimum an artist is paid) and a bonus for a sell-out - and what happens to the amounts in between is up for negotiation. The artist meets all of their touring expenses out of their cut (so that's transport and people and equipment that travels). So the economics of a tour can really vary. Some tours are budgeted around selling-out - others aren't. What will make a tour work for both an artist and a promoter is mostly completely opaque to the public.

It's possible that the promoter pitched larger venues than was wise - there have been indications that that's been happening since the first wave of post-pandemic concert enthusiasm. But it's just as possible that the promoter owned these venues and it was better to have an act in them than not. We certainly don't know from these figures that Louis' tour underperformed expectations, or who is carrying the cost of it is unknown.

According to that data, Louis sold around 130,000 tickets in South America (back of the envelope adding to the near 1000 - may be a bit off). If he'd sold double that it would have made him more likely to come back, or play more venues. But I don't think there's any reason to panic. Lots of artists come to New Zealand, don't sell out their venue and come back. And currency strength has a lot to do with who does and doesn't come here.

There could be a lot of good conversation on the levels venues sell at where fans talked about their own experiences. Not just the question of will they come to me (although that's very pertinent to me). But what sort of venues would you like to see an artist in? Might ticket prices go down? But that's never the tone of the conversation.

Instead an assumption in all this is that validity is scarce and measurable. I think it's really important to say that this is not true. It matters to some business people whether an artist sold 60,000 tickets or 30,000. But it doesn't really matter to anyone else.

And buying into a worldview that it does matter, will only harm fans mental health.

[monstersinthecosmos]

So I'm a newbie in the VC universe that discovered the books only a few months ago through the series and I have a question regarding Louis character so I came here because I believe it's a safe space for that. Well, to begin with, I'm not really into the vampire lore before so the show was okay to me and since I'm more of the reading type, I plan on reading the books after watching the movie too because I kinda like the aesthetic of that century. And oh gosh, that was the best decision I ever made because I am madly in love with it especially with Louis whom I find so relatable, but then that's when I realised that though I find myself relatable in Book Louis, that never came across me with Show Louis and I wonder what could be the main reason for it. Is it my lack of understanding the story in the show or the show doesn't show me the side of that Louis? I suppressed this thought for a long time because of the constant fandom war going around regarding the book vs movie vs show on Twitter and I only upload Tumblr not long ago so I really got no one to ask at that time. Sorry if my question is hard to understand/lacking in any sense, I'm not really good in voicing out my thoughts.

Hi! So like, TLDR; they are two completely different stories and two completely different sets of characters that happen to share names. I don't think it's a big mystery that one resonates with you and the other doesn't, that's just how it goes! And I hesitate to compare & contrast the two canons too deeply because I don't need any drama lol. But I'll try to parse some of this: I don't think you're missing something in the show. Unless I missed it too. 😅 But truly the show has a completely new character, and while I think they have some things in common, and I definitely really SAW LOUIS a couple times, they really aren't the same. And even in moments where I think I see Louis (ie: thoughtful, brooding, spiritually tortured) I think some of the decisions the show made to change the story just really narratively don't work for the book character. I really think these two pieces are best enjoyed as completely unrelated series, because we can tie ourselves in knots trying to make the book fit what we're watching, and vice versa, and every character on the show is essentially an OC. Of all the characters we've met on the show, I don't think ANY of them feel like the book counterparts. (Lestat is the worst offender for me personally LOL.)

The book I think also is about grief and Anne Rice often discussed using "the vampire as the other" as a means to write stories about feeling isolated. I think that's a huge reason why the books are so successful and why they reach so many people! It's such a broad theme and using vampires as a symbolic conversation means that we can make it about anything when we're reading. And especially like IWTV being written IN GRIEF I think makes that theme so so powerful like not just the pain but like, how disorienting it is, how lost you feel, how small and powerless. And feelings of grief come up over and over in the series, and not just literally about people, but about the sun, about life, about things we lose when we're forced to go on without. And I don't think the show really got into that topic; even using vampirism as a conversation the timeline of the canon is so short it doesn't really stick the landing. We get some brief glimpses of the life Louis had before, but by the end of the season his family is still alive. Barely any time has gone by. If this will be sort of an overarching theme over the longevity of the whole series we shall see, but tbh S1 was so absolutely unrecognizable to me as a book fan that I'm not super interested in following up lol. You'll have to get back to me in a few years and let me know how it went. 😂

ANYWAY. I outsourced this ask to a couple friends because admittedly I've never been a huge Louis fucker so some of the show changes were lost on me and I hesitate to speak deeply on either version of him for that reason but!

@somevagrantchild says: [...] the tv show created a whole new character in Louis’s place, in a different century with different values and a different background that gave him his own unique personality and struggles that are very different from book Louis. Which means the decisions and choices he makes are also very different as well as the way he relates to Lestat.

An example is show Louis using his vampire powers to get revenge on people from his mortal life vs book vampires becoming detached and not caring about those things anymore Also show Louis being selective about who he kills (coming up with the evildoer idea on his own) vs book Louis just never wanting to know, so being the most indiscriminate killer of them all @covenofthearticulate says: i mean god the whole goddamn point of louis' character is that he only really values humanity after losing it, so after being turned he's like desperately grappling to find some sense of humanity and identity and goodness and i think that's something that resonated with a lot of readers who feel Othered………whereas the show gave him vampire powers that were basically an excuse for gore porn and weird revenge power fantasy @covenofthearticulate also wrote this post (in her @sangcreole blog) about the decision to have Louis kill Lestat rather than Claudia and I think it sums up a lot of the dissonance as well.

Anyway yeah the fandom can be a nightmare about this topic because I think people can be very defensive and emotional, and unfortunately there's a lot of cult behavior and bullying when people step out of the party line, and it makes it difficult to discuss these as two pieces of media which are different from each other, without saying that one or the other is bad. And we all relate to characters differently, and for random reasons, and we often DO NOT PICK OUR BLORBOS LOL, so like it makes sense that a book character might resonate with you when the TV character didn't, because they aren't the same character, and they are acting from different backgrounds, they are being used for completely different narrative functions, and their relationships to the people & places & centuries around them are totally different stories.

[apensivelady]

I loved Thunderbolts. This will have spoilers, so if you want to avoid those, you better not read it.

In my opinion Thunderbolts is the best Marvel movie in a long time. It’s more than just a big superhero blockbuster, it’s a movie that cares about telling a story, and about developing its characters. I have fun with and enjoy superhero movies that are pure entertainment, but I love superhero movies that make me think. Unfortunately, superhero movies haven’t been delivering that to me. But Thunderbolts did. The loneliness and void that most of those characters feel was very well portrayed and discussed, just as the very character of depression. To me this was extremely spot on. As someone who struggles with depression, I felt that its portrayal was extremely accurate, and that it wasn’t reduced to a plot device. It was at the heart of the story. I found it brilliant how the actual villain is the void inside Bob, and that he cannot fight it alone. That’s exactly how depression works. It makes up a narrative about your total worthlessness, and although there’s a part of the fight you have to go through alone, that nobody can help you with, you need others to help you go through with it. The role of guilt and how it is intertwined with the void and loneliness was also very well portrayed. Guilt is ever present in depression, even when you haven’t been the sort of asset the members of the Thunderbolts have been.

Some random points I’d also like to make:

I think it’s a little weird, but kinda interesting, that Bucky decided to become a congressman. The guy has been used totally out of the rule of law during most of his life, so it kinda makes sense that he wants to be “within” the system for once. Even though he actually has to resort to his old ways to try and make it work. And that the system is not as straightforward as it probably should be.

Yelena Belova, my beloved! I keep falling more and more in love with her. All the kudos to Florence Pugh’s portrayal of Yelena.

Valentina is kinda awesome. I say kinda because it feels wrong to go straight to awesome. Sure, she’s wrong to be experimenting in human subjects with a total lack of ethics, but I liked seeing how she came about (poor baby Valentina) and how she is so quick to turn things around in her favour. Also, I loved Julia Louis-Dreyfus portrayal.

I loved Mel! That’s it, that’s the random point.

Alexei trying to save his baby girl Yelena was everything! Alexei is always amazing!

I actually liked Valentina turning the Thunderbolts into the New Avengers. Sure, Thunderbolts is a much cooler name, but I liked the New Avengers thing (even more that it was created on the spot to save Valentina’s ass).

I absolutely loved that Yelena and Ava are always a mess. I mean, it makes total sense that they wouldn’t be all perfect, they are fighting! I liked that in Black Widow we had already seen the women look tired and beaten, but we get more of it here, and I loved it. I love that Yelena’s gear is completely functional and not sexy at all. It’s so refreshing seeing her in combat boots instead of in wedges, like Natasha and Wanda!

I didn’t like that Taskmaster was killed. I wished we had another woman in the team. Antonia Dreykov deserved better.

I was slightly disappointed that we didn’t have a Zemo cameo, but what are we gonna do?

I don’t like seeing Sam and Bucky arguing over who are the actual Avengers. And copyrighting the name Avengers is a move I can’t see Sam making. But, then again, I couldn’t see Steve Rogers going back in time to Peggy Carter (yes, I’m still bitter about it and will be so forever).

I knew the Fantastic Four were going to time travel!

So, that’s it! These are my thoughts on Thunderbolts and I’m thinking about watching it again.

[skepticalarrie]

Hi!! Tiktok larry here with a few questions but i want to premise by saying i just discovered your account and so appreciate your clearsightedness and seriousness! tikok has a serious problem with people bandwagoning and posting ridiculous "theories" that dont stand up to two seconds of scrutiny😭anyways here are my questions...

1. ive noticed a few clips that, if posted get IMMEDIATELY deleted/taken down, like within a few hours. one is the weedgate clip where zayn says "i know you like d*ck". like if that clip gets posted its down by the next day. something else ive noticed is a complete lack of discussion of the fact that photos of freddie are photoshopped. its crickets. its obvious now that ive read through your tag but there isnt a SINGLE mention on tiktok. so my question is - do you think management teams have a legal ability to get these videos targeted and taken down? it seems like the only reasonable explanation.

2. my other question is thing on tiktok called "cakegate" which basically refers to the time the boys performed at a nightclub called G.A.Y and louis was drunk/acting flamboyant. apparently he got flown down to LA to get lectured by simon the next day, and ppl see this as the start of the serious closeting/media training. but i noticed its not a thing in your tags, so i was wondering if its been debunked.

thanks for all you do!

Hello, anon! Welcome to tumblr and thank you for being so sweet ❤️

1- I think there are far more reasonable explanations for these situations. Honestly, I doubt there’s a “management team” orchestrating anything in the first place. It’s much more likely tied to platform rules. So the weedgate video is probably being taken down because it features smoking and cursing, which violate platform guidelines. As for Freddie’s videos, those are likely removed for a couple of reasons: 1) he’s a minor, and platforms have strict rules about protecting kids, and 2) they can easily be flagged by others. Babygate has always been a huge polarizing topic... and people who believe the opposite theory are often very vocal about shutting down these kinds of rumours. Especially on twitter and tikok.

2- Yes, this is definitely a thing. I just don’t think I’ve tagged it specifically as “cakegate", not sure if I've heard that term before. But it's under my GAY GIG tag 😊

[sweetfirebird]

AITA

AITA If I try to Set Up My Brother?

goddessofmfdeathandspring:

This is a throwaway account because even though he never comes on here, my brother just knows things, so I am taking precautions.

My adopted older brother is kind of my best friend. When I say adopted, I mean that he adopted me. He found me shortly after I’d run away from the bio mom’s for the millionth time and even though he was just a teenager, he brought me back to his home and his family, where I was welcomed. Honestly, I’d love him just for that but we really are close. Which is why I want to do something for him about how lonely he is.

Oh, he’s not lonely in the sense that he’s alone. Our family is big and he is loved, and he has friends outside the family that he visits a few times a year. No, this is the romantic sort of lonely. We tell each other a lot, but he never volunteers anything about anything like that. –And before anyone says anything, look, he might be ace and that would be fine, but I truly don’t think he’s aro. Why? Little things. The way he looks whenever someone in the family brings their new boyfriend or girlfriend or lover to meet him. (It’s sort of a complicated family dynamic but for this, you might think of him as like the family patriarch? Or something along those lines. Although he’s not even thirty.) Things like that which tell me that my brother, let’s call him Louis, doesn’t want to be alone in the way that he is.

And ok, it’s not just romantic loneliness. There is really no one around on his level. For some background, Louis is a polymath. He’s very smart, and he, for lack of a better way to explain it here, knows things before other people do. Added to that, he has some disabilities as well as some facial scarring from an incident when he was like 19. Personally, I think the scarring makes him look like a wizard or something from a fantasy game, and honestly, the people in town don’t seem put off by it—the opposite in fact—but he’s sensitive about it. He’s also very tall and, as I have overheard more than once in the shop where I work in our small town, to most people, he’s hot. I’m not sure if people are too intimidated to ask him out, or if they do ask him, but then realize midway through their first conversation that he might be a little awkward, but he is also just… on a completely different level than they are.  

He’s not rude about it. If anything, he’s too nice to people who don’t like finding out how much he knows.

Anyway. What I wanted to do is ask someone for help finding someone for him. It’s just that the person I want to ask is maybe not Louis’ favorite person in the world? So… Louis is not straight, and our town is very… accepting in some ways, but tricky about this one issue. (A big name in our town is gay and for some reason this gets a lot of wannabe small town royalty heated.) The person I want to ask is I think gay.(I’ve never asked his preferred label but he has off-handedly discussed men with me from time to time. But even if he’s not gay, he still knows people and isn’t a bigot. He is also well… if one person in the world could intimidate my brother right back, it would be this person.

I’ll call him Robert. Robert is the opposite of my brother which might be why Louis gets weird around him, tense and stiff and more awkward than I knew he could be. Robert is bossy, and, opinionated and feels things out loud, if that makes sense? And he can see more about people than even my brother can. So I want to ask him if he knows of anyone who might do for Louis, in town or anywhere close by. I don’t think he will be angry, but my brother might be. From the way he frets before any encounters with Robert, you’d think Robert had kicked his ass once or something. As if tiny little Robert would. He’s just busy all the time, and distracted, and if he snips at Louis, it’s over silly things like how he thinks Louis works too hard or lets people in town demand too much of him.

Which is rich, coming from Robert, who is constantly working, and really needs someone to take care of him according to my mother, but when I ask who would do that, she just makes a funny face and asks if I’ve seen Louis recently. All the same, Robert will fuss over Louis, and peck at him for being overworked, and chide him for wearing store brought scarves and things (Robert is a highly sought after fabric artist) all of which usually makes my brother frown in return and then go off and mope for a while.

He doesn’t explain when I ask, and only ever says nice things about Robert. But, as just one example, the last time Louis had to go over to see Robert, he paced in our kitchen for ten minutes before finally girding his loins to drive over to Robert’s house. I have no idea what happened once he got there, but when he came home, he only stayed for about an hour before he packed his things and went off camping in the woods for a while, which is how he broods.

But I really can’t take the way he watches when the kids in the family do silly fortune-telling games to find their true loves, or the way he avoids the subject when one of our brothers who has decided he is a matchmaker tries to discuss it with him, or how quiet he gets when I suggest he go out to the one bar in town that caters to the younger crowd so he can find someone. Once when I suggested it, he just smiled sadly and didn’t say anything except that he was, “Waiting.”

Ugh right? It’s terrible. He’s a little different than most, yeah, but he should have someone who isn’t afraid of him and can look out for him. Because Robert is right. Louis does let people in town demand too much of him.

So. Even knowing about his discomfort around Robert, WIBTA if I snuck behind my brother’s back and asked Robert to help me find him someone?

Edit: A lot of you in the comments are convinced Louis has feelings for Robert for some reason. I don’t even know how to tell you how ridiculous that is.  

[felixcloud6288]

Fullmetal Alchemist Chapter 11

We're getting into the conspiracy thriller of this arc.

Last chapter, I went over the general timeline of events that have happened since chapter 8 and showed roughly 3 weeks have passed since then, with a little over two weeks being spent in chapter 10.

The main reason I did that is because this chapter opens with a followup to the fight between Scar and Gluttony. Roy's squad is inspecting the rubble and found Scar's bloodied jacket. Meanwhile, Lust and Gluttony confirm they failed to kill Scar and Lust is going back to Central.

This scene would have to have taken place about two weeks before everything else in the chapter. This would also mean Lust has been in Central for about as long. As long as no other major events happen in East City, we can assume Roy's group has been dealing with the rubble over those two weeks and the next time we see Roy, the timeline will have reconverged.

Maria and Danny were constantly whispering to each other last chapter and it's nice to see someone call them out on it.

Ed and Al seem ready to give up their journey after finding out what is required to make a Philosopher's Stone. They wouldn't willingly condemn someone in order to fix their own mistakes. Ed was about to ask Al something but they're interrupted by Alex Louis Armstrong. With a little inspiration from Armstrong, they're back on their feet to try finding the truth within the truth Dr. Marcoh mentioned.

We got a map, this time of Central, and once again, it's not useful for gleaning any information about the city layout. At least there's a park.

Once again, Maria Ross and Danny Brosh are getting sucked into things way above what they signed up for. They were assigned to be bodyguards and now they're privy to a potential conspiracy that the research department was performing human experiments.

Brigadier General Basque Grand, who Scar killed, was in charge of the Research Department. Armstrong mentions he was killed a few days ago. "A few" is a highly subjective unit but I'd say greater than three weeks is more than a few days.

A couple moments throughout the last section of the chapter show there are some conveniences to the Elrics' bodies. They can handle barbwire without issue, Ed can take otherwise lethal hits if they strike his automail, and being short lets you crawl through vents easier. Ed almost admits to that last one.

And then we find out there's enough evidence the condemned research lab is still in use, including two guards who are former prisoners whose souls were bound to armor like Al. The seal Slicer has is different from Al's. Not sure if that means there was a different ritual involved or if the symbols are dependent on something to do with the material the soul is bound to or not. I don't know enough about Alchemy and occult symbology to comment further.

"Edward. I'm respecting your privacy by knocking but as your self-appointed guardian figure I'm coming in anyway!" - Alex Louis Armstrong

back

Spoiler Discussion

I'm honestly disappointed in the lack of detail in the map. I was hoping we'd see all five labs in relation to one another cause it turns out they're laid out in a pentagram formation which is used late in the series to capture the Human Sacrifices.

Also, I wonder if Brigadier General Grand was part of the conspiracy or not. The one time we see him in the Ishbalan War, he seemed eager to end it ASAP. Since the bloodshed was necessary for Father's plan, trying to stop the war goes counter to it. There is always a possibility he was aware of the Philosopher's Stone research without knowing the grand conspiracy at large or maybe he was completely in the dark. We'll never know.

Ed wanted to ask Al if Al blames him for being trapped in that armor. Maybe if Armstrong hadn't barged in at that moment, and Ed got to ask, and Al said no; then maybe Ed would have asked if they should just give up on their journey then and there.

[danlous]

I’m so curious about how they are gonna adapt the present between loumandstat, specially after Claudia’s death, I know it’s never discussed in the books but I doubt Lestat and even less Louis are gonna see Armand in the same light they did in the books, her death has to have some weight in their relationship and some consequences, at least I hope so. Also,as much as I love Armand I hope they don’t forget he gaslighted Louis and abused him for 70 years, I wonder what would Lestat think of that even if he did the same thing… all super messy but I hope they take it seriously, I live for the drama.

I've been wondering the same. Like in the books it's not really addressed and Louis and Lestat don't appear to blame Armand for killing their daughter. They deeply grieve her and Louis is dead inside and his relationship with Armand is destroyed, but they don't hate Armand and don't even seem to be angry with him. Already as a young teen reading the books i thought their reactions or the lack of them thereof felt weird. I'd guess the authorial intent was to portray how vampire relationships and emotions are completely alien from our human experience, and depict Louis' passivity and how it may make him see others too as passive spectators and events just something that inevitably happen without reason or active participants.

Since the story and Claudia's character are originally based on Rice dealing with her child's death of cancer it could maybe also be seen as a reflection of her feelings about that. Vampires represent death, sometimes literally called 'death' in the books and Louis as a character who's based on Rice herself couldn't blame or be angry at Armand more than she could blame or be angry at cancer or the abstract concept of death. There's a strong feeling of inevitability in how Claudia's death is written about, like 'she's been dead from the beginning and it could've never gone in any other way'.

However, like you say the show is a different thing. I think the vampires in the show come across much more human in their emotions and reactions and the characters are different, especially Louis who isn't really passive and apathetic in the way his book counterpart is. It's hard for me to imagine how in the show version Louis and Lestat are going to reconcile with Armand and have a loving relationship with him, whether platonic or romantic, after he participated in lynching their daughter. Purely from the outside writing perspective i do think they are somehow going to reconcile, because i think it's unlikely that the writers would choose to keep popular main characters apart with nothing but hostility or indifference between them for 5-7 seasons or however long the show is going to run. But it's certainly going to require a lot from the writers to make any reconciliation and forgiveness to feel emotionally coherent and sound for the characters, especially for Louis.

I think with Lestat what we see in the finale might actually hint that his feelings toward Armand could be something similar to his book counterpart. He's bitter but doesn't really seem to be that angry with Armand in the tower or loustat reunion scene. There are so many open questions and what we don't know yet but Lestat came across as much more active participant in the trial than he was in the book. My guess is that he sees himself and Armand as equally guilty for Claudias death, maybe even himself as more guilty, and so he doesn't hate Armand any more than he hates himself

[alarrytale]

Hi, I know this is random but with the live album dropping even tho I know maybe you don't keep up with their music as much or so I remembered but I was kinda looking forward to your posts cause as someone who has taken a step back but wasn't able to completely detach myself from the fandom cause I like the vibe and the fanfiction /art plus my beliefs didn't change it was just hard and is hard to see others in the fandom often almost overhype him, not to say he is bad but it's like he breathes and it's magical and I understand I've been there but now I can appreciate good work he does but I don't have to lie to myself if a performance is not great or feel guilty for thinking that. It was to the point of not knowing if my fave is actually great like look perfect, sounds perfect all the time or I'm just automatically saying that cause I and some of the fandom in a way programed ourselves into that not just us but other fandoms and their dynamic. I guess what I wanted to say is I love how you're one of the few on here where we and you can discuss things without fear but also be respectful and I appreciate that.

Hi, anon 💚

You're so welcome! I've hardly had a minute to myself this week so i haven't had the time to listen to the album yet! I very much intend to do it. I haven't been to a show and i usually prefer studio versions of songs, so i wonder how i'll feel about it.

And yes, we are allowed to not like everything about our favourite celebrity or artist, and express said dislike. It doesn’t mean we love them any less. We just disagree with some of the choices they make, some of their behaviour and sometimes we just don't like the t-shirt they are wearing because we have different taste. We are allowed to. That doesn’t mean we are right, that doesn’t mean it's the majority opinion, it just means that we, with our own reasons, are not liking this particular thing. No more, no less.

If the celebrity does something that is outside of what we deem acceptable, respectful and wanted, we are allowed to (and should) call them out on it. Celebrities aren’t perfect, but they need to be held accountable for their actions and understand that what they're doing is wrong. It will not be tolerated, brushed under the rug, and it may damage their career. Harry not wearing a face mask during the hight of covid and by that showing lack of solidarity, and Louis cancelling the Asia leg of his tour without showing proper remorse and respect for the fans who lost money and the ability to get to see him are examples of things that are not okay.

I think it's an important skill to learn and develop to be able to critizise without being hateful, and to dare to critizise when it's needed and to give praise and accolades when it's due. It's hard to be in a fandom with people who see everything through rose coloured glasses and blindly idolise their favourite. Especially in this fandom, with all it's history, lore and the incredible complicated and possibly unprecedented situation we're in, the gaslighting, closeting and lies.