#rip Larys you would’ve loved phantom thread and cronenberg

[banefort]

It’s always surprising that Larycent only really exists on the fringes of the HOTD fanbase when it’s easily one of if not the most compelling and complicated relationships. The erotic overlap between love and violence, his near-primordial compulsion to service her and win her affection despite recognizing that she fears him in the same instinctual way that the fly fears the spider. Not to mention its capacity for discussions of class dynamics, ability/disability.

Matthew Needham’s explanation for the SA scene, that Larys seeks to wrest her bodily autonomy from her through making her own limbs part of the crime, deliberately targeting her traumatic sexual history and conscience-stricken disposition is such an interesting concept. He seeks to invoke a disconnect between her and her feet, symbolically and literally disabling her. In his eyes, the only way for them to truly identify with one another, or for her to love him, is for them to share in their bodily trauma together.

It conjures the image of a rabid animal willingly and devotedly infecting another.