#please please please please be doomed by the narrative

[urgentkettle]

I think you’ve hit my point exactly. Dracula (book) and Nosferatu are fundamentally telling different stories. They have the same kind of monster, a similar cast of characters and story beats, and then they diverge both narratively and philosophically. They’re just different.

Let me be clear, I don’t think friendship would have saved Ellen. Nosferatu (the 2024 version especially with that opening scene) is rather fatalistic in this way. Ellen is doomed to die by the story no matter what happens. The only way to stop Orlok is for her to sacrifice herself, which is the only real choice/agency she is offered. She can die like his other victims, die and stay at his side as a monster, or die distracting him until the sun rises. All bad choices. And she is fighting like hell to live (and keep her friends alive) until it is revealed that there is no alternative. The fact that Ellen chooses to kill Orlok is an interesting and inline with the themes of domestic abuse and power. The 2024 version centers Ellen as the protagonist. This is a story about her.

Just as you said, the men are doomed in this same way. In the book there are months of time to collaborate and ride trains in order to defeat Dracula (DRAMA queen indeed). Even more so, the Scooby Gang are first bound together by their love for Lucy. which becomes their solemn quest to defeat Dracula at all cost (thank you Art’s fat wallet) and save Mina. As is shown by their affection and recognition of her cleverness, the whole Gang comes to love her too. Dracula is a story about the Scooby Gang. On the flip side, Friedrich can barely stand Ellen before things go off the rails. He throws Ellen and Thomas out on the plague streets when he’s had enough of her hysterical lady talk! As a group, the Nosferatu crew (help me workshop a more clever name please?) are bound by fear and an aggressive ticking clock. They don’t stand a chance.

Did you see the 1922 version? How’d you like it? I’ve got thoughts about that too. If I hadn’t seen it before the 2024 version, I would have liked this new one even less for not meeting my “but it’s Dracula!?” expectations. Going in knowing that the two are different made it easier to open my heart to this new one. If that makes sense. I’ve got the 1979 version on my watch list.

Bonus thoughts that are only spoilers for Dracula (book) under the cut

You didn’t say it did, but I’d like to point out that book Dracula doesn’t have a pretty ending either. Mina is saved, but not before she is brutalized by Dracula repeatedly. Jonathan is barely holding it together in Transylvania. Lucy dies and is damned. Quincy dies fighting in the final battle (justice for my man, they keep erasing him). Many of the film adaptations do make the ending prettier/neater. And I’m like, babes this is horror. The count is supposed to be scary; he’s a monster. This shit is pure suspense I wanna feel fear in my veins. But I digress.

I think a fundamental difference between book Dracula and Nosferatu is how the protagonists work as a collective. In Dracula, they are the Scooby Gang (trusting, collaborative, polyamorous). In Nosferatu, they are the teens from an 80s slasher (suspicious, deceitful, jealous). The count can be defeated, but only the power of friendship can save Mina.

[rainyinautumn]

right. let's talk about team BEST, team TIES, and where bdubs fits into all of this mess.

now, we all know that team TIES is remarkably similar to team BEST. 75% of the members are the same—the only difference is bdubs has been swapped out for impulse. team BEST was, in the later stages of last life, a complete disaster... almost entirely because of bdubs boogey killing tango, which was a betrayal so bad it made the group dysfunctional. it's important to remember that bdubs didn't have anything against tango—he killed him out of pure necessity. tango, understandably, didn't see things the same way. etho was firmly on bdubs' side, and skizz played peacemaker between them all (only to get left behind in a fight and be the first of them to go red/die for good but that's a story for another time).

team TIES is, so far, a fairly stable alliance. not only is bdubs (the guy who can be blamed for first putting a rift in team BEST) missing from it this time, but the group has an active grudge against him due to the fact that he killed skizz early on. this is most prevalent leading up to the showdown between them in episode two, where team TIES agrees to an alliance with the clockers with the specific caveat that they can't make any real promise of bdubs' safety.

if you've seen etho's limlife episode two (go watch it if you haven't), then you've seen the "dead weight" conversation between him and bdubs where bdubs reveals that he knows team TIES has been talking trash about him and takes offense, threatening etho. if you think about it, team TIES is pretty much bdubs' worst nightmare. everyone from team BEST is together again, but without him, and they've filled his place with the guy who was literally his soulmate during the last game. they seem to be functioning and they seem to be happy and they don't like him. despite his actions as a boogey in last life, bdubs did value his alliance with every member of team BEST. bdubs being disliked by team TIES is pretty much his own personal hell.

it's important that bdubs has that conversation with etho specifically, because he's the only one from last life that was definitively on his side after he turned on tango. he's also the only member of team TIES that bdubs has never killed. interestingly, etho holds his team at more at arm's length than anyone else does, being the first to move out of the bunker in order to work (solo) on his mob farm. in short, etho is the one with the least reason to talk bad about bdubs... which is why it hurts so much that he's the one bdubs confronts about it.

not all hope is lost, though! bdubs makes up with skizz after their fight and they walk away as allies. bdubs wronged skizz, and now those scales have been balanced. however, there are still two more members of team TIES with uneven scales against bdubs. tango came very close to killing bdubs in last life but never did, which indicates he would likely not pass up an opportunity to do it in limited life. bdubs killed impulse way back in 3rd life, and he's still carrying that grudge. I'm convinced that him giving bdubs a clock was just to lull him into a false sense of security, and that he actively plans to kill him once he's yellow or red.

once again, etho is the odd man out here. the rest of team TIES is a custom-built machine to make bdubs atone for his mistakes, each representing a grudge from a different season... with the exception of double life.

that's where etho comes in.

from the very beginning, etho wanted to ally with bdubs. he dropped hints and asked about his soulbound all throughout the season, but bdubs never reciprocated the offers. unlike impulse, tango, and skizz, etho doesn't want bdubs dead. he very much wants him alive.

etho's scale is the one it will hurt bdubs the most to balance. he doesn't need to die in order to balance it. he's done that—he went out in last life calling desperately for etho to fulfill his promise to give him a life, which he still hasn't done. it's etho who owes bdubs a life, not the other way around.

if bdubs really wants to sort out all the debts between him and team TIES, he doesn't just need to die to skizz, tango, and impulse. he also needs to kill etho.

[sofiaruelle]

They have strong 'bitter exes' energy. Love that for them 💕💅🏽

But also Mel, divorce your already devastated boyfie for this baddie, please.

[a-scary-lack-of-common-sense]

A phone call between brothers (takes place AFTER this incident and Fiddleford's phone call)

Sorry if this is OOC!

[what-am-i-doing-in-this-fandom]

sweet child, you didn't even stand a chance

[anna-scribbles]

they should've been at the club(infertility treatment centers)

[theellipelli]

planning for the future

[heyitslucky]

local transgirl can't stop taking L's

[fun-esta]

[wolfienation]

if you could retell the tale

wouldn't you want to tell it kinder?

wouldn't you want to give them peace,

even love, where you could?

quote from here

[turrondeluxe]

Mikey, waking up from his slumber with a start: Something Just Happened.

Leo on the kitchen floor immediately after eating cheese from the fridge at 4am:

Based on this post where followers and me end up deducing Leo is lactose intolerant.

[duckiiieluv]

he’s doomed by the narrative and still serving cunt

[msflora-lynn]

Young Magnus doodle because he's my comfort character.

also bonus that's inspired from the whole Shaitan interaction thing:

[sepiamestus]

red string of fate

[jannacalendar]

I understand why it wasn't possible, but it's such a shame we couldn't get Jenny back for The Wish. She and Giles fighting a losing battle side by side and being hardened from it, but remaining each other's solace. Them piecing together the puzzle Cordelia presents to them and having faith in a world better than this, only for Anyanka to try and throw them by hinting at Jenny's death should they return. Giles faltering at the thought of losing her and Jenny, once again, sacrificing herself and destroying the necklace. The way she sees it: she'll either be dead by The Master's hand or by her own, and only one of those inevitabilities gives the man she loves a chance of survival. She kisses him as she plunges herself into the abyss, wanting the last thing she experiences to be his love.

Giles waking up the following morning, the pang in his heart he always feels whenever he remembers Jenny accompanied by a newfound feeling of emptiness, and he's not quite sure why.

[adhd-merlin]