#louis actually said that

[jaywriteshome]

Cue the larry breakdown

[nashvillethotchicken]

A lot of people in the iwtv Fandom regurgitate antiblack talking points particularly wrt Louis being femme/effeminate/gnc and it's genuinely so disgusting like no, Louis is not making his partners engage in domestic labor when they participate in the businesses and investments they are partial owners of. No, Louis is not being the patriarch of rue royale when lestat leaves the house after beating Louis within an inch of his life. No Louis is not "masculine for his culture" especially when compared to other black men in the same time period. People will actively ignore canon to make Louis into this hypermasculine black brute and Lestatr or armand into these shrinking violets that are oppressed by Louis when he's not that at all. The only times he's ever acted even close to that stereotype is to assimilate into a white supremacist society that expected that of him in order for him to earn a living and to please Armand, which causes him great distress and visibly worsens his mental health to the point of Louis lashing out at Claudia and being so entirely numb that he self harms. Louis is not this hypermasculine black brute and a lot of people try to make him into one bc of unconscious bias surrounding black people (black people have been stereotyped as hypermasculine, angry, overly violent and sexual deviants since the 1700s) or to absolve their non black favs of the actual patriarchal and oppressive violence they enact on Louis and Claudia or a combination of the two. It's disgusting, do better

[alonetogether]

INTERVIEW WITH THE VAMPIRE | 2.08

[and-fishing-equipment]

genuinely my favorite thing about louis is the atrocities. he's cute and all and he's funny and kind sometimes but also...... he makes terrible decisions, hurts others and himself, is arrogant and avoidant and has depression as well as terrible taste in men. he frequently manipulates himself and others without even meaning to and the lies he's told himself about his own life have influenced him so greatly that he can't even recount events from his own life without unintentionally twisting them to show him in the position that is most cathartic for him to talk about. through all of this i still love him unconditionally. it's such an interesting character concept. what if your protagonist and narrator was so unreliable and whiny and biased all the time but you're hearing a nuanced portrait of his feelings as he made all these dumb as hell decisions. would you still sympathize with him? could you do it?

[liloslittlethings]

happy birthday louis!

[thegirloffans]

I could never be a vampire bc I would've sat there and listened to all those Vampires go on & on about wanting to go after Louis De Point Du Lac after he just described in explicit detail how he Itachi Uchia'd an entire coven in a single night in his book... and you want to go after him? Are you dumb??

[firegiftlouis]

What pisses me off most of all about this fandom’s reaction to calling Armand “Arun” is that, stupid takes aside, there are actual reasons to be mad at Louis in this episode, but they all involve his relationship with Claudia and you guys don’t give enough of a fuck about her character and story, so instead y’all decide to make shit up about how Louis is “acting like a pimp again” and “called Armand his slave name” (y’all know damn well Arun is not his fucking slave name!!).

It’s all very transparent, disingenuous, and yes, very fucking racist.

[ivyithink]

all vampires are born out of trauma

[chappellrroan]

I HEARD YOUR HEARTS DANCING!!! YOU WATCHED THE WHOLE THING LIKE SOME CREEPER!?!!?!!! AND THEN I WATCHED YOU PULL OVER AND DRAIN A DOG AND RUN DOWN AN ALLEYWAY FOR TWO MORE RATS. THAT IS NOT LIFE!!!!!!!! THAT'S CAUSE *YOU* TOOK MY LIFE.

[delicatepointofview]

gonna have to deal with people missing the point of louis singing 1d songs in festivals... don't get me started on the other covers

[lesbians4armand]

i really do love the daniel x fake rashid dynamic just for how delicious the power dynamics are. the assumed age gap and servitude putting daniel in a position of power that he is not really in at all in dubai in a house of a vampire. but that same assumed dynamic giving “rashid” knowledge that daniel does not have as the personal assistant to a vampire, who is fed on by him, and as daniel assumes, he also sleeps with. Daniel is jealous of this proximity to louis but jealous of “rashid” himself as well, wondering how he tastes.

then of course, the fact this is all a premise. Daniel is in no position of power at all, hes being played with, toyed with, all his private comments and desires are transparently observed by not one but two vampires that have the power of life and death over him.

but they ALLOW this, they allow daniel’s perceived power, his desire, putting themselves in a false submission to him as both an interviewee and a servant, letting him feel this power as a taste, but every time he gets comfortable in it, reminding him that its a game. wonderful truly

[book-tease]

I think some people are way too willing to think of lestats pov as the truth and it's very confusing to me bc what about lestat as a character makes you think he's gonna be more truthful than louis-

[statementlou]

Tbh i am not surprised that a person who openly talked about having drinking problems since 1d days, because of how crazy 1d worked has been agressive. What surprises me is people being surprised (they never seriously saw drunk person?). But i am also confused about this whole book. Apparently Maya said that that book is not fully bout Liam but compilation about her exes and some of the worst parts are not about him. But recently she said that the book is “ofc about him” so what is true then? Or did she meant it that ofc some parts are about him or that whole book is about him?

Sorry, just confused

I also am not surprised- we've learned so much more about the real stories of things and about the guys' actual lives over the last years, and the story that has unfolded around Liam has been totally consistent throughout if you've been following it, and so the information Maya is telling us is shocking and upsetting but not difficult to believe. I got an anon yesterday saying they were worried about getting similar revelations about the other boys, like "if Liam could be doing this we just don't know, any of them could", and while in a way that's always true I guess, anyone could be doing anything in private like... that doesn't really concern me. Because none of these Liam revelations are coming out of nowhere, there have been many MANY steps along the way leading us here if you've been watching, and he has talked openly about both his mental health struggles and his addiction issues. So to answer that anon... to find out something similar about Louis would in contrast contradict everything we know about him and no I'm not worried about it. Is he probably very irritating, absolutely, but an abuser or a loose cannon, well that news would shock me. But anyway as for the book I don't find it strange that she was nervous when it came out and treading lightly and later decided, fuck it. In the absolutely on point tiktok she dropped today (YES👏GIRL👏FUCKING TELL THEM👏) she even mentions attempts to keep her from publishing the book, presumably by Liam's team, that I am riveted by and cannot WAIT to hear more details about actually- like I said I don't find it at all strange that she was nervous and downplayed it a bit then. But if she says now that it's just about Liam, well, I would say it's been clear from the beginning that the book is their story. Maya herself brought up the parallel of songs being written about stuff and I think it's the same thing; it's true (she was in an abusive relationship that involved certain kinds of events) but maybe not 100% literal (I'm sure details were changed to make the story work, it's not like a word for word timeline of their interactions or whatever).

[zubazee]

The 7 year depression when Claudia went missing is so interesting to me. The fact that Louis and lestat still stayed together during those years. We always talk about lestat not thinking Louis loves him but I also believe Louis feels that way too! And the 7 years shows that! Like either of them could’ve easily left at that point. Lestat could’ve had enough and peaced out. The same with Louis, he could’ve walked away too or asked him to leave. But they both stayed. Both waited for the other person to leave. Both waited to be told to leave! How much longer would they have stayed like that if Claudia didn’t come back I wonder?

[kindaeccentric]

'vampires are bad at art', factoid just statistical error. most vampires are quite decent at their crafts. Marius De Romanus who paints like all his works were made by AI is an outlier and should not have been counted

[pynkhues]

Speaking of Louis, Lestat and masculinity, I think a point that people always ignore is that Louis' masculinity is important to him and he's attached to gender roles/preconceptions far more than Lestat/the way Lestat is not. I think it's communicated in the show pretty well. It's why he feels comfortable in the role of the successful businessman to Lestat's supporting spouse, but not when the power dynamic is flipped, and why Lestat feels comfortable to be the supporting spouse as well. Your recent post reminded me of the "Come to me" lyrics, and I think Lestat placing himself in the feminine role of Mélisande is another example of that. Plus the Marie Antoinette dress (note Louis being kind of uncomfortable with the camp of it all lol).

I totally agree, anon. I think the show's pretty deliberate with the fact that Louis' at his most comfortable in his relationships with both Lestat and Armand when he's acting as the businessman / breadwinner and they're acting as the supportive spouse. I mention it in the post I think you're replying to, but Lestat playing host at The Azaelia and helping to manage the staff - presumably without being paid - very much plays into that sort of dynamic, and it's one Louis seems to be repeating with Armand in Dubai given Armand's helping to effectively administrate the sales of Louis' art investments. It's a form of unpaid domestic labour which in a loving relationship, can be completely fine, but does often come with (perceived or real) connotations of roles and a certain power dynamic.

A huge part of that I think is tied to Louis' sense of masculinity and the role he wants to take in his relationships, but I also think it comes from a genuine place of wanting to be the provider, which has likely been borne out of the role he took with his mother and siblings as a young man. I talk about that more here, but I do think he needs to feel like he can look after those he cares about, and I actually do think it comes from a pure place even though it can be and is often corrupted by the fact that he's capable of real cruelty and vindictiveness when he feels scorned (i.e. he wants to provide for Grace because he loves her, and he buys her that holiday for her honeymoon, and he wants her to have the house to raise her family in, but when she disowns him, he doubles down on that out of spite not because he's letting her go and moving on, but because he's holding her to it. He knows she and Levi could never afford it without him, and he really rubs that in her face at their mother's wake. She'll always be living in his house, and that once meant something pure and good and loving, albeit paternalistic, and now it fundamentally does not).

I didn't really go into it in that last post, but I also think Louis being a voracious reader is something that gets misread a bit sometimes. Like these days, it can feel like being well-read is more common with women, particularly in online spaces, but I absolutely see the connotations on the show of it being partially a performance of class and masculinity. That's not to say I don't think he genuinely loves reading - I really think he does, and I love that about him - but this is the 1910s through 1930s when hypermasculinity and wealth was very much tied to being well-read, and a lot of contemporary authors from William Faulkner to Ernest Hemingway to Joseph Conrad, were both depicting and exploring manhood in ways that were pretty formative for a generation of men.

On top of that, reading was a symbol of class because the only people who had the time or capacity to do it were people who were both educated and had money. Louis sitting on a park bench in a three piece suit reading Charles Darwin of all people is absolutely a show of class and masculinity, and the fact that it dovetails into a conversation about diet, again, is a broadcast of wealth and status. Sure, we're talking about eating people, but if you're looking at it as a metaphor, it's symbolic of Louis having' choices about what he eats when, which is inherently about having the means and status to do so.

Plus I feel it's pretty important context for Louis and Lestat's bickering in 1.05 when Louis' reading Madame Bovary - Lestat calls Louis a snob, and Louis goes in by basically calling Lestat shallow and uncultured, which is a) very funny to me, personally, I love it when they're mean to each other, haha, but also b) I think very much evident of Louis' feelings of masculinity, particularly given it happens directly after he cites Claudia calling him the unhappy housewife. Again, Louis' rejecting that role - the house is a mess (so they've either fired their staff, or they've quit), Louis' not going to do it and neither is Lestat, and Louis' sprawled on the couch reading from his husband's library and dragging him for being too frivolous to read them.

Again, I think Louis genuinely loves reading, but I also do think for him it's fundamentally a part of his identity as a Cultured, Intellectual Man. It's why he doesn't take to the campiness of the Theatres des Vampires, or as you said, get involved in lestat's Mardi Gras performance (I'm always sooo fascinated by the fact that we don't get a reaction shot of Louis to that sequence at all - again! It feels loaded!) I think his sense of masculinity is, well, pretty traditionally masculine, and I think it's pretty vital to his self-image.