#and you KNOW lestat would kill them for clearly not seeing the vision and having poor taste

[stabbingandorbeingstabbed]

idk how music reviews work like if pitchfork just assigns a writer to an album or if they volunteer or what but i have to imagine music writers would either outright refuse to review lestats albums no matter how much buzz they're generating OR they'd have to put their lives on the line and hope they can make their adulation sound sincere enough regardless of the merit of the music itself bc you knowwwwwwww if they gave him less than an 8.9 that writer would be in some kind of elaborate writing-related vampire saw trap designed to bleed them dry over the course of 8 hours within like minutes of the piece being published. like you're taking your life into your own hands 100% if you take that on

[madly-empirical]

Surprises from reading IWTV for the first time I knew the TV show was a reinvention/reinterpretation from the books, but just coming off of re-watching the movie there were some things that I was surprised to find out: - Louis helps Lestat kill someone before he's turned him into a vampire (???) - Louis kills Lestat's father but makes him forgive him first without knowing the full story (it's like a mercy killing because the old man is dying so that "merciful death" nickname is a whole thing isn't it) - Louis kills a priest for being understandably annoyed when someone confesses to have been killing for a hundred years (did you think he wouldn't be offended be serious louis) - Louis says killing people was not a moral, but an aesthetic choice (very surprised, I thought the killing people was the main point of conflict but no?)

- There's a subplot with another wealthy slave-owning family where Louis tries to stop Lestat from killing a young man and is involved with his sister named Babette when he fails (it doesn't go well for her...) - Louis knows that Lestat wanted to be priest but was taken out of school by his father - Lestat calls books "mortal nonsense" (lol) - Louis' late brother who had religious visions also had yellow hair so parallels - Louis is weird about money (he's spending all my money, but he never has trouble getting his own, I have to manage everything, I keep him dependent on me, etc., etc.) - Lestat massacres the slaves on his way out, and Louis appears to join him (Very hard to tell for sure) - Louis drags nearly everything about Lestat except for his physical appearance - Lestat falls asleep at the opera (they're long Louis!) - Lestat loves Macbeth and will shout lines from the play at passersby on the way home (unfortunately that's the love of your life) - Claudia is colder and creepier in the book (it's interesting that she never plays music after Lestat is gone...) - Lestat threatens to kill Claudia all the time behind her back and at least once to her face - Louis notices that Lestat is afraid when Claudia asks questions about vampires stuff - Lestat, in a clear fib, tells them there's no other vampires besides them - Claudia tells Louis that she's going to kill Lestat and he's in the room where it all goes down - Claudia gots the hubris ("Do you think I will have my power and his when I take him?") - She is also super convinced that Lestat is dead the second time, but girl why? - Claudia and Louis have troubles before Armand shows up stemming from the murder of Lestat (she did tell you what she was going to do!) - Louis pretends to a vampire hunter to explain some weird stuff in Eastern Europe where they find mindless vampires (like some else said, why would you bring your 5 year old daughter to the vampire hunt??) - When they can't find any other vampires like them, Louis is like I might have believed that we were the only ones if Lestat was the kind of person to have been some kind of serious sorcerer — but he clearly ain't (lol) - Louis is totally head-over-heels ignoring all red flags and ready to go as soon as Armand shows up (even after Armand is like killing vampires is exciting that's why it's forbidden and btw I used my powers to influence you to make Madeline a vampire...) - Madeline is a dollmaker and makes elegant miniature furniture for Claudia so she lives like a fairy queen - Armand keeps going on and on about a tower and how a healthy vampire would survive falling off it (-_-) - Armand is like yes, mindless vampire are called revenants and it's like how do you know that but no one asks - Lestat is in Paris when Claudia is killed, clearly tricked and confused he thinks he can take Louis home with him (He is also afraid of Armand. Insane that there's like ten years between the publication of IWTV and TVL, it's so clear that something went down between the two of them but there's zero hints in IWTV on what it was) - Lestat is frantic and weepy when Louis sees him in his grey gardens area. Louis thinks he is dying the way vampires die according to Armand, he can no longer endure immortal life (maybe it was the being murdered more than once that got to him Louis? Just maybe that might have had some effect...) Overall, I found book!Louis infuriating, hypocritical, complicit (NOT passive) and kind of self-involved. Impossible to tell what it felt like to read it for the first time without having knowledge from later books. Reading TVL makes me more sympathetic towards book!Louis because there's just so much he doesn't and couldn't know — especially about Armand and his hypno-powers. Obviously, it's very likely that he was doing a similar thing to Louis to what he tried to do to Lestat. Also, Lestat's version of himself sounds exhausting. He wants to go out every night!!

[vividxp]

Liveblogging my second watch of IWTV Ep 5 because I need to process and get it all out

The opening scene with Louis feeding on Rashid. First off this was hot, not even going to sit here and lie to y’all. Rashid clearly enjoying the experience was just the cherry on top. But to be serious, I was team Rashid is Armand for the past week, because it seemed to add up and honestly from the descriptions of what book Armand looked like I could see the vision. Even Louis drinking from him didn’t blow up that theory for me as we know that vampires can feed off each other.

The only thing that’s giving me pause is mentions of eating honey and pineapple to make his blood taste good. First off that not only puts the Armand thing to question for me but Rashid being a vampire in general. I haven’t read all the books so I don’t know if I’m missing vampire lore that would explain this. But then again, look at Rashid’s reaction after the feeding compared to Damek. Damek, a seemingly bigger and buffer guy, could barely stay on his feet but Rashid was perfectly fine? Something is up, I continue to have a lot of questions about Rashid. 

Secondly, the notion that this is Louis’s way to commit suicide by making himself a target of other vampires. The description of vampires scaling the walls reminded me of a fic I read about Louis basically doing the interview as a cry for help and Lestat receiving the message. Rashid says he cares about Louis more than Louis cares about himself. What is this dynamic? It’s ridiculously intriguing.

Louis’s behavior towards Daniel was on the callous side. Daniel asked him to stay out of his head, twice, but he continued to push. Thinking about it some more it felt like a defensive manuever...like Louis purposely wanted Daniel to be mad at him or scared of him just in time for the next part of this story. Perhaps in an attempt to deflect from the obvious questions? 

Judging by the preview, it didn’t work and I’m glad. I am absolutely going to be here for episode 6 because I need answers. And I need them now. Let’s talk about this shit.

Back to the show, cut to Louis breaking the necks of the pigeons for Claudia to feed on....man, this scene really strikes a chord in me as I said in a previous post. 

Jacob Anderson mentioned that one of Louis’s struggles is that the violence is necessary, he needs the byproduct of the violence to thrive and he hates it. I can’t help but think about episode 3 when Lestat breaks the spine of the guy Louis picked. As we see, when he goes to Lestat playing piano in the next room, Louis is willing to do the same thing, kill a guy and leave him in her room. The depth of his concern for Claudia is overriding his previous moral hang-ups about killing. 

My other question on re-watch is how was this able to continue for so long? What did Claudia do with the pigeons? Did she eat them? Did she throw them away somehow? Is that why no one noticed the smell of dead people parts? 

The next scene is Louis and Lestat arguing about Lestat’s A+ Parenting skills. Louis’s comment that “she’s in there because of you” is pretty shocking to me. And I can understand why Lestat reacts like absolutely the fuck not. In fact, on first watch, I literally yelled ‘no, Louis, she’s “in there” because of YOU’. On second watch I practically did the same. 

I think Louis has to sit with the fact that he wanted a daughter, he wanted redemption for his act of murder that harmed his people in retaliation and he wasn’t thinking of the horrible consequences. 

We’re not even past 7 minutes into the episode and I already have paragraphs. I’m going to break this into parts because otherwise I fear it’s going to be too unwieldly.

[i-want-my-iwtv]

I hope the rumours of Louis being a brothel owner aren't true, but if they are I can sort of see why they're going for this route? I mean, with a black Louis they can't have him being a slaver anymore, so maybe they're trying to find something that is also morally reprehensible for him to be.

TL;DR: My kneejerk reaction was to be saddened, and I don’t like that this is starting up, and will continue to fuel, fandom drama. Ultimately, if we want peace, we’ll embrace the fact that the existence of this adaptation doesn’t take away from the existence of the books, and it also doesn't mean we have to acknowledge it.

It makes me wonder whether AMC wants us to make a storm about this. We’ll see...

After all, what makes this adaptation any more important than the graphic novels of the ’90s, the graphic novel Claudia’s Story, movie!IWTV, or movie!QOTD? In fact, many fans here on tumblr consider VC to be a trilogy only!!! and don’t accept the majority of the PUBLISHED CANON so what makes anyone think we have any obligation to swallow this AMC adaptation as some kind of gospel?

I see movie!QOTD as a buffet of ideas carried in an official fanfiction work, and I don’t accept as my headcanon the various things it changed about the books that I didn’t particularly like, such as merging Magnus and Marius (which, IMO, effectively made both characters more morally reprehensible). I accepted the things I did enjoy, like casting a Black/POC actress to play Akasha. I see this AMC adaptation as a buffet of ideas, some can be taken, and some not, it’s just another official fanfiction work.

[Anon, I need to catch other ppl up on the information, too.]

Deadline.com informs us that in the AMC adaptation for Interview with the Vampire, Jacob Anderson has been cast as Louis. I'm not familiar with him, but it looks like he’s a successful actor, from Game of Thrones and other things, he’s also joining Series 13 of Doctor Who. I’ll have to check him out from an acting standpoint!

Aside from his talent as an actor, this is by far the most controversial thing that's happened in VC fandom recently. I've been thinking about this for a few months now, talking about it privately online and offline, still gathering my thoughts. So this post is not engraved in stone, it’s initial thoughts on this.

I’m glad to see ppl talking about it and I’m sure we’ll have more public discussions. I’m trying to discuss it very carefully, but also, this is an entertainment blog, my opinions are mine alone, and I’m not looking for dogpiling on anyone, I have no obligation to respond publicly or privately to anything. Plenty of other ppl have differing opinions on this. So take all of the following with more than a grain of salt, I’m not being salty, I’m providing the links to the little info we’ve seen pulicly, I’m giving my initial thoughts, and I’m also trying to add a little levity because ultimately, again, this is an entertainment blog, and I try to add a little humor to help with such serious topics, humor can help ppl talk about controversial things.

-----

The casting of a POC/Black actor (I’m sorry I don't know the preferred terminology, let me know if you know what Anderson prefers) confirms at least one part of theilluminerdi articles that stated that Louis’ race will be different from the books. I didn’t post about these before bc I wasn’t sure how reliable theilluminerdi’s sources are (and I'm still not sure), but this was one major aspect that theilluminerdi announced before Deadline did, so now seems to be the right time to share those articles. For now, you can go check them out yourselves rather than have my reposting of the information, trigger warning: mentions of sex workers and race in the changes to the canon story of Interview with the Vampire.

>>>theilluminerdi articles from May 21, 2021 and July 15, 2021:

www.theilluminerdi.com/2021/05/21/interview-with-the-vampire-amc

www.theilluminerdi.com/2021/07/15/interview-with-the-vampire-amc-2

^Meme of Dr. Ian Malcom from Jurassic Park reads: “Your writers were so preoccupied with whether they could that they didn’t stop to think if they should.”

I’m using that meme with a little levity here, clearly an AMC adaptation of vampires in which the producers/writers have chosen to change the race of a main character (arguably the original protagonist of the series) isn’t in the same VICINITY as the dinosaurs in Jurassic Park that broke out of containment and killed visitors to the park, but John Hammond’s intention for the creation of that park was very good, as I assume this race change was intended. Time will tell.

“But with this place, I wanted to show them something that wasn't an illusion. Something that was real, something that they could see and touch. An aim not devoid of merit.”

“Creation is an act of sheer will.” 

- John Hammond, Jurassic Park

Race is a more complicated subject than ever, so for AMC to make this bold change, I hope they have POC and Black writers on staff and are handling this very carefully. Even then, no racial group, including POC and Black people, are a hivemind, disagreements are bound to happen in the writing room, whether in good faith or bad. People have different intentions and motives, compromises will probably be made with the story in many ways, we all know how it goes with collaborations; the end product is a shared vision among multiple creators. This could be a potentially controversial adaptation, I don’t know whether they’re aiming for that or not, but with the elements it has so far, it seems to be headed that way.

Here's a comment by "Angellus" on the 5/21 article. It's undeniable that there's going to be the accusation of racism thrown at anyone who has any negative view of this change, regardless of their reasons. I find it unfair and narrow-minded that any negative response is automatically assumed to be coming from a racist point of view. To say that changing Louis' race is unequivocally an improvement fails to take into account how that change has a Domino effect on all of the other parts of the story. Not the least of which is that, if he is still a slaver/slave holder/plantation owner/(insert your preferred term) that adds a whole new racist element to his owning Black/POC people, even though, apparently there were Black/POC plantation owners. 

Not the least of which: How will this change impact his relationship with Lestat? Particularly when Lestat has the added issue of being described in those articles as having “mind control abilities” and “insistent that he gets what he wants and when facing rejection,” a terrible combination in terms of consent, even in a relationship of the same race, let alone invoking Caucasian/white dominance over Black/POC people, AND Lestat being the catalyst to Louis’ questioning his sexuality:

Lestat is insistent that he gets what he wants and when facing rejection, petulance can quickly turn to ruthless rage which causes frenzied acts of horrifically brutal violence. Lestat also has mind control abilities. Lestat initially infuriates Louis, but this soon turns to fascination which leads Louis to question his religion and sexuality. 

^Screencap reads: "I love how racist everyone is in the damn comments, this doesn’t pervert the story you’re all racist and it’s disgusting. I’m looking forward to it, I hope you keep crying your salty racist tears asswipes."

It makes me question whether Angellus truly believes what they wrote, if this is an ideology, or a troll. I would suggest their use of the term “pervert” is correct though, pervert means: “alter (something) from its original course, meaning, or state to a distortion or corruption of what was first intended.” That’s what this race change does, factually. Although, in this context, “distortion or corruption” carries a negative connotation. It would take a lot to show how this change does not meet the definition or “to pervert,” though.

I hope the rumours of Louis being a brothel owner aren't true

I agree 1,000%, I was hoping that these were just rumors. But, aside from the race change, if this were the only change, I find Louis being a brothel owner to be equivalently morally reprehensible to being a slaver/slave holder/plantation owner/(insert your preferred term). Ideally, they’d change his career to something that doesn’t involve benefiting from the bodies/labor of others in any morally reprehensible manner.

I mean, with a black Louis they can't have him being a slaver anymore, so maybe they're trying to find something that is also morally reprehensible for him to be.

He might still be a slaver. Who knows. Being morally reprehensible as a mortal man didn’t seem to me to be crucial to the story, but they still could have chosen something better. It seems to me like they want a brothel so they can have eye candy for an audience who want to see sex workers, maybe full frontal nudity. 

-----

What also gets my attention is that Anne and Christopher Rice have not yet posted publicly about it, which leads me to believe that this change wasn’t their choice. They take every chance to brag when they’re proud of something, every chance to crowdsource about casting ideas or which VC books Anne’s fans liked best, etc., and in this case, as of Aug. 31, 2021, (and to be fair, maybe I missed it), I haven’t seen either of them post about this on the official VC FB, Anne Rice’s FB, Annerice.com, Christopher Rice’s FB, or christopherricebooks.com. If it had been their choice, I think they would have gladly trumpeted their credit by now, but maybe they’re waiting to do it in a specific venue. Time will tell.

[nalyra-dreaming]

Woah, I never considered that Louis was really trying to claim Lestat died in ep7! I thought he was just downplaying the fact that he'd knowingly let him live. But if he was really gonna run with that lie he must've been planning to make huge edits to the story, right? TBH we may never know because clearly Daniel wasn't fooled, so they'll have to re-think their strategy. I'm still sus about the missing pages from Claudia's diary right before Lestat's last words, what do you think was in them??

I think they contained the recount of the "real" kill, namely her slitting Lestat's throat, as in the book. I just cannot see her leave the room tbh. And the words she wrote in Lestat's blood do not match what Louis told either.

I don't think the missing pages are gone - I just think they were put somewhere else. But yes, we might never know for sure what they contained, but then again... that might not be necessary in the sense of the word. I do think they'll revisit it, but I don't think they'll rewind the whole thing.

As per his intention - I am unsure whether he really, really wanted to remove Lestat from the rest of the interview (like the movie did, in a way?) - or if that was something that Armand had wanted him to do.

Because Lestat's part in the rest of the tale is one that is extremely painful to Louis after all... and now he will have to face that.

Before, he would have probably just skipped over it all - the visions, the trial... maybe there would have been a trial, but it would have been shorter, or maybe she would have had an accident?! "We got to Paris, I met Armand, unfortunately Claudia died..." But now, with Lestat at the trial... and his part in it... and Armand's part in it all, and Lestat's and Armand's shared history... mhh.

Quite the different story. Quite the different emotional impact. An emotional impact Armand had probably (likely) wanted to prevent.