#lestat does not think ahead far enough to be machiavellian

[toriangeli]

Armand's red flags in 2.02

You know how people kept accusing Lestat of isolating Louis from his family? And then Louis actually kept visiting his family, so if Lestat was isolating him, he did a really shit job of it?

Yeahhh. Armand shows us how it's really done.

Disclaimer: Armand is my favorite, precious boy, and I will defend his right to be as fucked-up as he damn well pleases, but he is indeed very fucked-up. So don't come at me accusing me of being biased in favor of Lestat (and even if I was, so what? this is Tumblr, not BBC News). I love Lestat, I love them all, but Armand is my trash son and if he isn't horrifically fucked-up on the show like he is in the books, it's a massive betrayal of the complexity of his character and the logical outcomes of his background. He hurts, and like any creature in pain, lashes out because of it. He knows how to do all kinds of diabolical shit, but he doesn't know how to be a person, and that's why I love him (trying to remember who the Youtuber was who said, "No one's a hero, everyone's a victim" about this series because they were so right).

First off, Assad is truly phenomenal at creating this effect:

If you don't suspect Armand of the shit he's about to pull, it's not your fault. This is how he is. Part of it is real innocence, in a way, or perhaps an inverse of innocence--he doesn't realize this shit isn't normal.

So it's very striking to me how Armand laid the foundation for his relationship with Louis so subtly and early on. He approached Louis in the park while he was alone, Claudia nowhere to be seen even though his invitation was for her as well. Claudia would ask questions. Armand wants to dangle the carrot before any questions are fired off. By the time anyone in the coven actually speaks with Claudia, she is already sold on them all. There is no time for her to form suspicions. With Claudia on board, Armand has free access to Louis. She feels at home with the coven, so she's not watching Armand too closely.

Then at the Delacroix mansion, Armand warns Louis against the rest of the coven. He says "a few of" the coven members are unforgiving, though he doesn't say who, which would be useful information if Louis is to defend himself (spoiler alert: it's all of them), just tells Louis to close his mind to the others. So Claudia is with the rest of the coven, while Louis is available only to Armand. Armand does not give this warning to Claudia. The only person she can hear it from is Louis, who she won't believe. They're now spending time apart, weakening the link between them. Armand knows he can seduce the hell out of anyone he desires, and once he does that, all he really needs is to break the filament binding Louis to Claudia and he's got what he wants.

He also warns him not to contact Roget again, which is probably good advice, but what Armand knows that Louis doesn't is that Lestat is alive. And Roget is the one person in the world Lestat would be able to contact if he could. So in the unlikely event that Lestat gets the chance to call Roget, Louis will not hear of it.

In just a few sentences, Armand has managed to distance Louis from Claudia, Lestat, and everyone else in the coven.

And how does he do it? By making sense, basically, by preying on Louis' preexisting (and sensible) fears about the coven. It makes sense for Louis to be on his guard. But Armand has set it up so he appears to be "different" from the rest of the coven, the only one Louis can trust, while issuing vague warnings about everyone else. And while Armand in the book is a pretty hands-off leader with the TdV, don't think for one second he can't do anything to protect Louis and Claudia himself. Here, he's acting like he has no sway with these people. He does. No matter what he says, he does.

So yeah. I'm really impressed with how smart the writers are being about this so far.