bambolae

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back…. soon

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     HEADCANONS   —   CHAPTER  I.    the portrait.

      so let’s talk about the portrait of donna and angie that we see hung in the beneviento home.  first, i’d like to begin by pointing out how donna is never seen without her veil until you see the portrait of her, and then when you kill her. in the church portrait she’s in her veil holding angie and during the meeting when you first meet her she’s completely covered. the game consistently makes a point in showing you that she does not show her face, even mentioning the scar she had on her face as a child which then became the spot in which the cadou formed itself onto her. so why did she pose for a painting without her veil, and why is there no indication of a scar or the cadou growth itself when this was clearly painted long after being adopted by miranda? 

      my headcanon for this is that mother miranda made her sit through this portrait painting as a thinly veiled threat. a punishment, even, for not being good enough.

      it was not framed as such - in fact, her mother told her this was a gift. donna was forced to sit before a painter with her face & growth on full display, something she would never ever do under any normal circumstance, all because her mother told her she had to do this for her. this was the holy woman who adopted her, gave her power and land for herself, and a whole new life. she would never say no to her and so she sat there for hours until the painter was finally done. he was not permitted to let her see it until miranda approved of it.

      when miranda came back, she looked over the painting and decided it was perfect. the painter was ushered out, unpaid for his services since it was an honor to do this for mother miranda and the second lord. once the door was shut donna was allowed to see and to her bewilderment, her face was pure of any blemishes. it was like looking into a mirror of a better life where she was almost pretty. and that was exactly what miranda told her she was. pretty. much prettier without that on her face, she implied. perhaps they should hang this in the church alongside the portraits of the other lords, she thought out loud. donna did not dare to question her no matter how much her body begged her to say no.

      miranda left her with this painting as a gift, and you never decline her gifts. donna bowed her head to her and muttered a quiet thank you, low and not under the facade of a doll. when her mother finally left, she took one last look at the painting and covered it with a stained scrap of fabric she had near.  it was brought up stairs, up into the attic, and tucked between two boxes. she has never hung it up in her home. she never will unless she is ordered to. it serves as a horrid reminder of what could have been and what never will be.

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this song has donna vibes

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I had a really weird dream about re8 getting a dlc that was just a donna walking simulator

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    HEADCANONS   —   CHAPTER  I.    the dolls of house beneviento.

so, everybody’s view on donna in relation to angie is very, very different. there’s a lot of interesting takes that i’ve read and discussed with friends and since the game does keep it fairly vague, i think that it’s important to establish how i view the dolls of house beneviento.

let me begin with the doll we all know and love, angie. here’s the history behind her.

angie was given to donna in her youth by her father who was a doll maker. donna has struggled with her mental health ever since she was young and she was likely selectively mute as a result. she took a very intimate liking to the doll she named angie and created a sort of persona as the doll to speak to people through her. later, after donna was adopted by mother miranda and implanted with a cadou parasite, she had part of the parasite planted within angie’s head and she is able to control angie through it to this day. 

there’s a lot of questions surrounding angie’s level of sentience and how connected she really is to donna. the way that i’m portraying it is that i believe angie, alongside all of the other dolls, are extensions of donna herself. they do not have their own sentience. she has a set of dolls (angie being her main one) that represent her as a person. i’m making this clear because this is not to say that she has multiple personalities despite the dolls acting very different from one another. the dolls represent the parts of herself that she could never show from a young age and that never developed in a way that she could healthily display her emotions and thoughts without using them as a buffer. to know her dolls is to know donna. 

side note: while angie is completely controlled by donna and does not have sentience, there’s still moments where angie will blurt something out that donna reacts to in an embarrassed manner. this is the equivalent of you blurting something out without realizing it LOL especially if youre somebody who doesn’t have a filter. donna doesnt have much of a filter, shes got a funnel that goes straight through whatever doll shes controlling. in VEEERY rare cases where she’s comfortable enough to talk, donna does blurt out things you’d generally hear angie say and the disconnect is kinda hilarious.

donna grew up in a very strict religious setting as one of miranda’s few “successful” experiments and subsequently one of the future ladies of the village. she was on a tight leash and it’s clear in the way she’s spoken about by miranda and the others that her mental illness was not treated well. any signs of it made her appear immature and childish, nobody took her seriously due to how she never felt comfortable speaking, and the expectations of essentially being a new prophet figure in the cult made it so that she had no childhood at all and no time to explore herself or her emotions. every semblance of emotion was treated like a problem and donna quickly learned that she could only express herself through angie without getting in trouble. 

what was originally a soft blanket that comforted her and helped her with her anxiety was now a crutch. it was the only way she could speak without the fear of being shunned. angie became the truest version of herself - she is the life that donna is too scared to embrace. she is forever in mourning for her parents, her failures, herself. angie celebrates life, finds humor in things that nobody else does, says and does the things that donna would never say. everything she has repressed inside generally comes out through her. 

now, some smaller details for the dolls. each and every doll in the beneviento household that has a part of donna’s cadou implanted into it was created by donna. the dolls will have the beneviento crest on them usually in the form of small buttons, embroidery, accessories, etc. she likely commissions any metal pieces from karl, but generally does it in bulk unless its a special project since they’re usually buttons, pins, brooches, and the like that are used consistently throughout her own clothing and the doll’s. many of her dolls rotate through an ever increasing wardrobe of clothes she creates for them.

her favorite dolls are regularly maintained and cleaned. angie herself is… nowhere near as grimey and nasty as she is in the game. as much as i love the creepy vibe, it makes no sense for a woman who loves a doll this dearly and clearly creates a PLETHORA of dolls herself. she is still cracked and stained from her youth before she learned the arts herself, but donna regularly cleans her and changes her into various white dresses. her hair has been rerooted as well because it… is not that hard to fix that either c’mon. it’s a curly blonde updo. she’s still a creepy little beast but she’s at least maintained. 

donna can control any of her dolls and can control multiple at the same time, but the more she controls at once the simpler their actions will be. for example; if she’s fully focused on controlling angie, then the other dolls are likely idly walking around or turning their heads but they won’t do much else. she can focus on controlling one doll fully & switch between two others simultaneously before it becomes too much for her to handle. any doll with a cadou fragment implanted into them is a part of donna and will idly do things without her even thinking about it. 

if you touch one of the said dolls, she’ll be able to feel it. hearing & sight are limited to the doll she has her focused on and  she can’t really taste or smell through any of them which makes touch the only sense she can always feel through any doll. she has a similar connection to the mold - infested plant life in her territory where she can feel what’s going on - this makes sneaking up on her hard unless you can get through without touching one of the many dolls or one of the plants she’s connected to through the mold.

donna has made many, many dolls for the children in the village (without the cadou…. duh….) and it’s known that it was created by lady beneviento. that’s the most the village people interact with her, usually. 

so, let’s go over the main four dolls that donna has fully developed “personas” for. i went over angie just a few paragraphs ago but as the “leader” of this quartet she needs to be in this roundup too

ANGELA  “ ANGIE “  BENEVIENTO.

donna’s very first doll. represents her in her truest, unfiltered self. the child donna was never allowed to be, says the things she never got to say & does the things she never got to do. the doll she’s usually in control of. quote from earlier paragraph:  angie became the truest version of herself - she is the life that donna is too scared to embrace. she is forever in mourning for her parents, her failures, herself. angie celebrates life, finds humor in things that nobody else does, says and does the things that donna would never say. everything she has repressed inside generally comes out through her.

GIANNA “  MRS. CHUCKLES “  BENEVIENTO.

the first doll donna created herself made in the vision of a clown from a book. the most playful of the lot, most likely to approach you to play a game with her or to crack jokes. similar to angie but with much less of a bite to her words. represents her repressed joy & humor.

LADY ELISA BENEVIENTO.

one of donna’s earlier creations made when she was a pre-teen going through one of the worst mental health lows she’s ever been through. she fixated heavily on this one to keep her occupied in her loneliness, very intricately sculpted & painted. made to look like a sad princess. she still considers elisa one of her best quality dolls, big comfort doll for her. represents her sadness, doesn’t get a lot of use unless she’s struggling with her depression more than usual. 

GABRIELLA BENEVIENTO.

created in her early twenties and has debatably the best craftsmanship out of the four, only rivaled by elisa. made during a very angry time in her life after mother miranda said something to her that made something inside her snap for the first time. she stewed in her anger, isolated in her home & created a doll to cope with her emotions. she forgave & forgot but gabriella did not. doesn’t have any obvious, distinctive design but is regularly dressed in dark colors and has so many knifes under her skirt. much heavier gothic inspiration than the rest of her dolls. she’s usually the first one to attack an intruder. represents donna’s repressed anger & rage, the fight to her flight. doesn’t get a lot of use unless donna feels like she needs to be protected or you somehow managed to rile her up. extreme fear might bring gabriella out as well if she feels like she needs to attack.

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au where donnas the final boss before Miranda because it makes a lot of sense since everybody uses physical attacks on him but hes made of mold and its virtually impossible to really kill him.... but donnas the only one who fucks with him mentally and hes not immune to that by any means. if they didn't do her so dirty by cutting her part short can you IMAGINE how fucked Ethan would have been after going through her part?? Break Him Down?

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hands & shadows

— marcia lippman

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Milan Kundera, The Unbearable Lightness of Being (trans. Michael Henry Heim)

[Text ID: “If a mother was Sacrifice personified, then a daughter was Guilt, with no possibility of redress.”]

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☙   ——   unprompted   /   @cericata​

hey donna what would your fursona be?

  .  .  .

   *  holds up angie  *

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I had a really weird dream about re8 getting a dlc that was just a donna walking simulator

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please take a gander at my Donna board....

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Maéna Paillet

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im at work but lemme just say that its so irritating to see donna be constantly watered down into this woman who did nothing wrong and just needs some help because..... shes very mentally ill? she has a sad backstory? feeling bad for her is fine i do too but seeing the things she does in the game that make her an incredibly effective villain and saying its not her fault is ugly. you can link her actions to her devotion to Miranda and blame her all you want but everybody actions are linked to miranda because everybody but Heisenberg is devout to her 😭 everybody sucks in this game that's what makes it fun

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Nevermore, Forever, 1976, Yannick Bellon

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HEADCANONS   —   CHAPTER  II.    faith.

side note: this is definitely a huge world building hc so if you like this then please feel free to use it for your blog! id like you to let me know just cuz its fun but like besides that everyone’s free to take pieces of this. except for scoob. she’s blacklisted from my headcanons.

so this is a general headcanon on how i think the cult,  the faith of the black god,  generally works. here’s what we know about it in canon:

mother miranda seems to be the ultimate authority in the cult since she’s the one who started it around the black fungus supercolony in/near the village. 

this supercolony is what the believers worship as the black god. miranda is a sort of prophet for it. 

the four lords are considered high enough authority to have their photos hung up in the church alongside miranda’s. 

the cult itself is neopagan with strong ties to christianity since the village was originally christian before their current belief took over a long time ago. 

now onto the headcanons! the way that i see the four lords & miranda is that i believe they’re all regarded as sorts of lesser deities among the people, right below miranda & the black god itself.   the dimitrescu daughters would probably be seen like something as angels that serve & protect alcina and are similarly looked up to as religious figures, though lesser than everybody else.

each lord serves over the area that they were given - castle dimitrescu & house beneviento are probably more over the villagers homes and shops since theyre within the village, karl’s factory & the wheat fields would likely encompass the farmers and workers, & moraeu’s reservoir would be for the fishermen and other workers in that area. if i was to push away from canon some more, i’d even separate alcina to be over the shops (probably the nobles too in the past) and donna is over the residential area just so everybody gets their own thing. 

i think that the villagers pray to each of the lords when theyre asking for something in particular… for example; fishermen praying to moreau for safety, farmers to heisenberg for good harvests, so on & so forth.  

i like to think that they have titles besides lord/lady [last name] or first/second/third/fourth lord that would be something like “lady of abundance” for alcina. that sort of format for everybody that represents what they symbolically rule over. so to have them all laid out….

MOTHER MIRANDA,  rules over all of the village,  prophet of the black god.

ALCINA DIMITRESCU,  rules over the “financial district”,  first lady of abundance. lesser known,  but also known formerly as the angel of rage.

BELA DIMIRESCU,  the angel of sorrow. CASSANDRA DIMITRESCU,  the angel of pleasure. DANIELA DIMITRESCU,  the angel of joy.

DONNA BENEVIENTO,  rules over the “residential district”,  second lady of the hearth.

SALVATORE MOREAU,  rules over the “water district”,  third lord of the bounty.

KARL HEISENBERG,  rules over the “industrial district”,  fourth lord of the harvest.

while i believe the lords are all feared, i think its more realistic that is a sort of fear of god situation rather than actual fear up until the purge before the game starts. suspicions are totally there; people going missing after going to castle dimitrescu, fishermen getting eaten by a giant grotesque fish, you know. all of that. and i think there are rumors of man-like monsters that roam the outskirts of the village (the failed experiments that miranda casted out), but when you’ve seen that your whole life you just… find that normal. its a terrifying thought but theyd see these things and just tell each other not to go outside the border of the village because theyre safest in there. scary shit like this being normalized is one of the things that make cults so scary in media AND in real life. 

i think when the cult was first taking over the village they had much more of a social hierarchy with nobility, middle class, peasants, etc. as the years passed by the hierarchy became much more… condensed. there are some richer folk, some working people, some poorer people, but overall? nobilitys not really a thing anymore in the “modern” age, especially with the only notable noble standing being the dimitrescu house. i imagine since alcina makes so much money off of her wines and, at least in my canon, she’s over the financial “district” of the village she’s been able to stay on top while everybody else fell to working class or lower. we don’t get to see a lot of the village because its completely ruined by the time we get to it, but realistically there’s gotta be some shops and other things besides homes since theres clearly a church everybody goes to.

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WHY   DO   YOU   HURT   ?

     because this isn’t enough for you.

it was built into you. designed for you. there is pain here because it was meant for you, and how fucking dare they. your suffering is not their right. you hurt because they gave you ways to suffer and carved it into you when you could not breathe, because the intention always was that they could weaponize your pain against you. it is Yours. You are Yours. How fucking dare they. they cannot make you theirs; do not let them try.

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v; —– OFFKEY. // AU TW; DOLLS / MANNEQUINS, CULT / HEAVILY RELIGIOUS ELEMENTS, PSYCHOLOGICAL HORROR ELEMENTS, HALLUCINOGENICS, DRUGS / DRUGGING, INSECTS, MEDICAL PROCEEDURES, CANNIBALISM, MUTILATION, AND OTHER COMMON HORROR THEMES. 

THIS VERSE WILL CONTAIN NO SHIPPING OF BELA/DONNA. There will be NO romance or sexual themes AT all related to this verse.  Read more here.  // @bambolae​

Note: Reminder that everything that happens in this verse is discussed by all parties, as this is not a closed verse if you’re interested in being part of it please feel free to ask but be aware we don’t contain our muses or pull punches. It’s going to be a dark one, this all written for the fun of horror and does not reflect our actual thoughts or opinions on specific subjects. For full transparency many of the things explored and discussed are traumatic ( never assume someone hasn’t had their own trauma and stories even when exploring specific topics in fiction. Some topics may even be personal to the person writing it, be respectful and careful with baseless accusations.) and will be handled with the care and attention that it needs. Thank you for your time now onto the actual fun stuff. 

Synopsis: After a particularly crushing failure Mother Miranda grows more impatient with her eldest child. With the winter months closing in, she chooses a punishment that she is sure will remind Lady Dimitrescu of exactly what is at steak should she continue to fail. Choosing Alcina’s eldest daughter as the sacrifice of her Mother’s blunder, she sends Bela off to live with Donna Beneviento for the winter months with no word of if or when she would be permitted to return. Whispers of making mistakes in entrusting Alcina with three daughters makes their rounds, and perhaps giving her youngest daughter a chance would be the next best move. As the winter months thaw out there is no word on Bela being permitted to return to the castle, and within a few years Donna would rather die than let her. Declawed and defanged, she is no longer a Dimitrescu, not even in name. 

PERSONALITY SHIFT

Bela changes a lot in this AU, with Alcina out of the picture and Donna being basically like talking to a wall, Bela has to discover a lot about herself. At first she reverts back to a predatory animalistic state, extremely feral and dangerous. However, due to the plants and Donna’s constant sedation, she begins to rediscover pieces of her humanity. The dreams are fragments of memories long lost, these start to piece back together the woman she once was. Donna also takes great care in getting rid of anything dangerous, it starts small and builds over the years (from her prideful claws to her powerful fangs they all have to go eventually so she can be Donna’s ideal daughter), constantly filling Bela’s head with the fact that she’s just a young lady and it’s Donna’s job to protect her. It’s not cute to fight or act like a beast, Alcina maybe allowed that, but she’s not a Dimitrescu anymore so she will behave and act like a proper daughter fit for the Beneviento house. She does develop genuine affection for Donna over this time, Donna does help her with her anxiety and encourages a lot of self expression as long as in the direction of her humanity and not her monster. Not to mention the crippling loneliness would get to anyone. Donna starts to become well respected in the village, becoming a popular house due to Bela going out on Donna’s behalf to bestow gifts and collect offerings. The tales of Dimitrescu castle having three daughters, becomes a forgotten fact as didn’t the story always just include two? 

RELATIONSHIP SHIFTS // BASELINES

- Aunt Alcina: In the first few years of this arrangement Bela misses her Mother terribly. She even sneaks off to the castle multiple times in an attempt to beg her to save her. When nothing can be done after time she eventually starts to see their relationship in a new light. Donna commonly speaks how it is a Mother’s job to protect their children and she spent most of her undead life protecting Alcina. Donna begins to question her older sister’s parenting and convinces Bela that she never loved her and was simply using her as a glorified guard dog, she even treated her like an animal and the second she was gone she replaced her with one of her sisters.  - Daniela: With Daniela forced to step up into Bela’s position, Bela starts to develop resentment for her youngest sister. She can’t believes she would do something like that to her especially since she misses her so bad. Daniela becomes aware of the shifts within her older sister and when she can beat her in a fight due to her physically weakening state she worries her older sister may be in danger and not just being an asshole per usual.  Cassandra: Not much changed between the two, besides Cass maybe being a bit worried about her.  Mother Donna: Now taking the role of her Mother figure Bela loves her dearly but also fears her greatly. She never feared Alcina would harm her, and she knows Donna will never physically harm her but she has seen the horrific power of the second lord first hand now. She fears of disobeying, and she genuinely wants to be a daughter she is proud of. Her feelings are much more complicated, she blames it on the humanity, but knows it’s because she still longs to go home.  Angie: Angie is an extension of Donna and Bela does know that. She treats Angie like she’s her Mother as well which looks absurd considering Bela is 6′2 without heels and could crush her little skull in her jaws in seconds. She still lets Angie scold her and insult her, obeying without too much fuss.  Uncle Karl: Interestingly enough Karl and Bela have more of a relationship in this AU, taking away Bela from Alcina soured Mother Miranda at least to the eldest daughter. Bela knows her new Mother is devout as she’s gaining favor from Miranda now. She commonly turns a blind eye to things she notices within the village and might even drop by for a visit if for no other reason than to get out of that prison more. Karl won’t rat her out for straying off her worshipping and she appreciates that.  Mother Miranda: JAIL FOR MOTHER MIRANDA JAILLL, but no really Bela actually develops a distaste for her in this AU, even though she comes to love Donna she will never forgive her for making Alcina mourn her as a daughter.