#SORRY FOR THE SECOND LESTAT DRAWING IN LIKE LESS THAN HALF A DAY

[rustedpipe]

diva downnn

[rapha-reads]

IWTV rewatch

(how to resume the second half of this episode: *Captain Holt's voice* paiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiin)

Season 1 episode 5 [A Vile Hunger For Your Hammering Heart] - part 2/2

- The way Louis' face is still as a statue as Loustat make their plans. The way you can feel the resentment covering the entire house.

- Lestat immediately shutting down going to Paris.

- And now welcome to the portion I'd like to call "Claudia Suffered More Than [insert your favourite martyr figure here]". Oof, Bruce immediately gives off a bad vibe, more than that white student who is after all only reproducing classic patterns of racism and classism.

- [Louis] "As the depression set in on the nation, I barricaded myself within the dilapidating walls of 1132 Rue Royale, educating myself from Lestat's library, ignoring all other duties of the role Claudia once mocked me for - the unhappy housewife." - was the raccoon really necessary? It is a nice touch, I won't lie, but really hammering in the point: the depression Louis talks about isn't just the Great Depression, it's his own (I like hammering points too, sorry). But you know what, I WISH I could lock myself wherever my books are and just ignore the whole fucking world and everyone in it for 3 or 4 years.

- [Louis] "Flaubert's style is so dense." - L'éducation sentimentale is, I'll admit it, a horror to read (but less than Le Rouge et le Noir, Stendhal really gave it his whole to make that one unbearable). Madame Bovary on the other hand is a gem.

[Lestat] "Louis Armstrong is in town tonight, playing at the Pelican" - when a bookworm introvert dates a music addict extrovert - beware the conflicting schedules and discordant ambiances. (In which I am Louis and the perfect day is a quiet day with classic music playing lowly in the background and a pile of books)

[Lestat] "You sound like every pompous Sorbonne student I've ever eaten." - ... As a former Sorbonne student, I have absolutely nothing to say in my defence (I studied French and English literature and linguistics for a year with a minor in audio-visual media, fyi). I am sadly very self-aware of how pompous I sound whenever I start talking literature. Sorry not sorry. (would absolutely not protest if Lestat decides to give me a visit. Ahem. Who said that.)

- [Lestat] "'You draw me into your gloom.' [Louis] 'It's your fault she's gone. If you hadn't pushed her... ' [Lestat] 'Claudia.' [Louis] 'If you hadn't done your...' [Lestat] 'Claudia, Claudia. I cannot listen to this insanity about Claudia one more time, bordel de merde.'"

I know we justifiably talk about Armand's "Lestat, Lestat, Lestat" litany, but Lestat's "Claudia" is quite good too.

Also, can't quite decipher what Lestat says in French there. English accent too thick. I think it's "ils me chient dans la main [gibberish]" ("they" or maybe "he shits in my hand") but don't quote me on that.

- Bruce's been stalking Claudia for a while, huh. And interesting to note that it's partly Louis' fault, his repetitive calls to Claudia that attracted his attention.

- Louis's destroying that table. I'm going to focus on that instead of whatever happened to Claudia or what Louis's doing to Daniel, no thanks. Just like how Armand immediately calms Louis down, and gonna cheer for that slap, good one, Daniel, well deserved, about time.

- [Lestat] "It could be her, but I am the one who is currently standing in front of you, and unlike Claudia, I am a full-blooded adult... with all the right appendages. So if all my considerable considerables continue to be squandered..."

'Stat... Yeah, I have nothing to say.

- [Grace] "Whoever you are that took my Louis" - yeaaah, if one of my sibling would say that to me, I think I'd just crumble and shut down. But at the same time, kudos to Grace for having the strength to bury her brother while he's standing in front of her and keeping whatever secrets he's guarding.

- [Claudia] "I spent time following Louis and Lestat now that I am my own woman, with no obvious sense of why I follow them, other than meaning slowly disintegrates without them... my companions in immortality. But today at the cemetery, I finally understood something so obvious, which I pondered for a decade... why they made me. To be Louis' sister."

*silently sobbing* It's the way Louis knows that passage by heart, and the way Claudia's prose keeps on being heartbreaking.

It's how Louis curls around his pain, and how Claudia makes herself taller in the face of this pain. It's how they don't even need more than an embrace and a word to make it better. It's how siblings who have gone through the same shit know each other so intimately. It's how that's the moment Claudia goes from daughter to sister.

- [Lestat] "The vampires out there are vicious. Oh. But you knew that already. Who did you meet out there in the American hinterland?" - oh, you are being especially awful, Lestat. I love you but you are being unfair. Even if you fear loneliness and abandonment, even if you've just went through seven years of not getting a single kind word or affectionate gesture from Louis... Lashing out, refusing to tell Claudia the truth about European vampires, the cruelty, the violence... No, that's not a good reason for it. But then again you wouldn't be Lestat if you didn't lash out when terrified and angry.

- Ouch. Contrasting that fight seen through Claudia's perspective with the s2 scene seen through Louis and Lestat's... Shivering. This is baaaaad.

Oh, no, no, no, no, I don't wanna see that part. I don't want to have to think about it and analyse it.

Man, I had forgotten how much that episode fucking hurts.

No, but the way Louis won't even say "I don't love you" not just because he won't give Lestat that satisfaction, because he lives to be stubborn and contrary, but maybe also because after all, after everything, that would still be a lie, and Louis doesn't lie; he forgets, he obfuscates, he redirects, he refashions his memories, but he doesn't lie... Even when his own life depends on it.

Episode insider:

Rolin Jones saying for Claudia "why was I the thing to make up for your mistakes". Yeah.

"This is where we start building the Anne Rice universe. As Lestat rightfully warned her there are wolves around the corner."

"It's the kid that goes 'My parents weren't all that bad. I have gone out and seen life. It is not all easy and conquerable'. And she comes back with hat half in hand, but with a mission - to take the good vampire and continue on with her life, and that is at odds with the other vampire in the house."

"It is about the fight of Louis, the fight for Louis's soul. I mean, in the end, it's 'Everbody Loves Louis', isn't it?" - Louis is catnip for vampires. And honestly I can relate. Did I say lately he's my favourite too...

That shot of Lestat hovering in the air all dressed in black with his hair floating around him while Claudia covers Louis's broken body with hers... Enraged Angel. Oh, that's worthy of a full oil on canvas painting.

Alright. That was harsh. And we're so not done. We love angst and tragedy, yey! *sobbing*

episode 1 | episode 2 | episode 3 | episode 4 | part 1 | episode 6 | episode 7