#vampires don't count

[nyquiltoyrifleheadphones]

character idea: moth, but it hates the light and white

[sophsun1]

Interview With The Vampire – 2.01: Episode Insider

[marypsue]

Man, it's cool and all if you see a metaphor for marginalisation in the monstrous, and if you want the power fantasy of 'what if you could just eat anybody who threatened you/pissed you off'. Me too.

However, as soon as you start saying 'no, these monsters are a 1:1 on Specific Marginalised Group, and you have to treat them in the fiction like they are directly representative of real human members of the marginalised group', BUT you also, in the fiction, make them hurt/kill/eat humans? And then try to shame me, your audience, for noticing or engaging with the bit where they kill people, because you made them directly representative of a real-world marginalised group? You have lost me, and also, I think, the plot.

[r-aindr0p]

You know a horse is a big animal even when you see them from afar in the fields you know they are tall. Yet when you get up close one you still can't help but think "damn that's a big guy"

All this to say I completely forgot this mf is 1m95 but hey c'mon Elias Rook wasn't trying to undermine you ! It's just a pleasant surprise to him since Elias tends to avoid Rook as much as he can outside of his animal magic shenanigans (in which he often gets caught by Rook and ofthen when he's a small not that cool critter, sigh...)

[m-for-now]

As someone who is genderfae (microlabel under genderfluid), I have a lot of different experiences with gender.

I just wish someone told me sooner that it won't go like "today I'm a girl" "today I'm an enby" but more like ,,, "today I am a swamp witch" "today I am a feminine victorian vampire boy" "today I am a forest goblin collecting people's stares about my gender expression like shiny rocks on the ground" "today I'm an androgynous pirate lady"

Like,,, sure, are those real genders? I don't fucking now. If a cisgender person asked me what I identify as that day, would I answer like that? No, definitely not.

But to my genderqueer, trans and genderfluid friends; do you get me? I can't be alone with this, right?

[robynator]

something something louis used to be a pimp something something armand was sold to a brothel

i don't know where i'm going with this but this realisation came to me suddenly and i refuse to be normal about it

(that and daniel calling armand a rent boy in season 1 like WOW man come on now)

[duckhoodiesblog]

I think they should be friends

(uncolored version under the cut)

[profanepurity]

Sketches of Dracula, his brides, and their currently living undead children 🩸🦇

[the-crooked-library]

The intimacy is important to show the contrast between Thomas and Orlok in the movie. Thomas repeatedly fails throughout the movie. He fails communication and understanding test with Ellen, he fails self-imposed masculinity test in general, he fails sex and intimacy test with Ellen. He even fails fully acceptance and full love test with Ellen because till the end he expects that Ellen can be somehow cured from her powers, and killing Orlok should do the trick, meaning he’s incapable of just accept her fully the way she’s without trying to correct it. The part that Ellen was happy for awhile with Thomas because for that time her powers were blocked is a big giveaway, that it’s already in fact wasn’t working between them from the start because if she could only be happy with him while suppressing huge part of herself, then such foundation was bound to crumble. Orlok meanwhile fulfilled the crucial basics for Ellen - understanding and acceptance of her nature and powers in full, intimacy and sexual realisation the way Ellen wished and imagined.

yessss exactly - as much as I do like Thomas as a character, and as much as he might care for Ellen, he's not a good fit for her, and she knows this!.. She wants, desperately, the sort of emotional connection that he will never be able to give without first unpacking the prejudices and insecurities that instruct his entire life and his opinion of her; and while that is not impossible, it is still quite unrealistic, given his background and societal context.

The reason Orlok is able to think outside those bounds, despite also being a man from an even older society, is because he exists in opposition to its restrictions. His attitudes are not reflective of whatever people around him would've thought of women or queerness or neurodivergence when he was alive; they are, however, directly informed by his making "covenant with the devil." Unlike the proper, god-fearing, Rational people that dictate Ellen's daily life, he accepts and desires every aspect of her that is considered "sinful" - her sexuality, her lack of deference, her eccentricities; and it is this fundamental understanding that she craves.

TL;DR -

"you could never satisfy me the way he does" was about emotional connection, not sex - and, of course, Thomas went straight ahead and proved her right

a relationship that is blocking her powers and allows her to be "happy" as long as she acts normal and hides her real self is not a good relationship. regardless of how one may interpret her connection with Orlok, Ellen's marriage to Thomas is an allegory for being in the closet/masking - and I personally think she deserves better

[whitehairandblood]

CW: blade (just the one), threatening language, begging, hunter/hunted dynamic, animal attack, graphic description of mauling, blood

(Let me know if I missed anything)

"Please... you don't want to do this!"

The vampire's pleas fell on deaf ears as the hunter advanced on their fallen form. They had cornered the vampire in a vast, empty warehouse, away from prying eyes or ears which could hear the vampire's useless pleas for mercy.

The vampire crawled backwards, one hand pressed tightly to the burning wound in their side. A silver tipped arrow, lodged firmly between their ribs, made every breath more painful than the last.

The hunter dropped their crossbow to the floor, unsheathing a blade which glinted in the light of the full moon streaming in through the high windows. Silver. Plated, not cast, but capable of just as much damage. The vampire's eyes fell from the hunter's face, widening in recognition.

"W-wait, wait!" They begged, growing desperate. "You don't know what you're doing. You're going to regret this!"

The hunter scoffed. Vampires and their silver tongues.

"No, I don't think I will." They replied coolly, darkly, stepping closer. The vampire held up their other hand in a pathetic attempt at shielding their face, but the hunter easily bypassed it, grabbing them by the collar of their shirt to haul them up from the ground.

The vampire cried out in pain as the arrow in their side was jostled. Dark blood bubbled out between their fingers to stain their clothes even further. Their feet struggled to find purchase for only a moment, before the hunter's weight pressed them into the brick wall behind them.

Their breath stuttered at the feeling of the silver dagger grazing their throat. It left a line of burning agony as the hunter angled it carefully- sharp point hovering at their adam's apple, ready to pierce.

"I was expecting something more," the hunter mused, "from someone as notorious as you."

The vampire's panic filled eyes focused on the hunter's face. Their pupils had dilated to let in the low light, allowing them to take in every detail of the hunter's face in perfect detail. From the hunter's point of view, it made their eyes look dark and soulless- like a shark that smelled blood in the water.

"They tell horror stories about you, you know." The hunter continued, "Those other hunters. No one has ever come back from hunting you."

The vampire shuddered as the silver blade danced across their throat.

"Why is that?" The hunter asked idly, "What makes a sniweling, cowardly little thing like you so hard to kill? You ran the moment you saw me. You cornered yourself like a moron, and even now you refuse to fight back. Why is that, hm?"

The vampire's hands raised shakily, grasping at the hunter's sleeves. Silver burned into the skin of their throat, making their eyes well with tears and the acrid stench of burning flesh invade their nose.

"Please... you don't have to do this. You can still walk away."

The hunter laughed- laughed, like it was the funniest thing they'd heard, before twisting the fabric of the vampire's shirt and driving their fist further into the vampire's ribcage. The vampire groaned as the air was squeezed from their lungs.

The hunter's grip tightened on their blade, applying careful pressure until the vampire bled and groaned in pain.

"Asnwer the question."

The vampire's squeezed shut eyes cracked open again, focusing back on the hunter's face. They grit their teeth and snarled, refusing to give the hunter the satisfaction of the answer they were looking for. The hunter sneered right back, pressing on the vampire's sternum hard enough to make the edges of the vampire's vision go dark.

"Suit yourself." The hunter growled, dagger poised for the kill. "Any last words?"

Something in the vampire's expression shifted, so sudden and so unexpected that it took a moment for the hunter to process the change.

The fear had been replaced by a haunting, eerie calmness, the hint of a smile evident in the curling of the vampire's lips. They stared at the hunter with those dark, cold eyes, so devoid of any emotion that it was hard to believe there had ever been any present. Once again, the image of a shark leapt to the hunter's mind- one which had slowly begun to circle its prey.

The hunter's breath caught, their grip loosening.

The vampire's smile only widened, eyes flicking to the hunter's right for only a moment before returning to the hunter's own.

"Don't say I didn't warn you."

Their only true warning was the sound of shattering glass and a snarling, low growl, before they were bowled over by something solid slamming into them at full force.

The hunter collided shoulder first with the rough concrete, skidding several feet across the ground before coming to a stop. Dazed from the impact and entirely caught off guard, it took one moment too long for the hunter to gather themself and scramble to their feet.

They didn't even make it off the ground before claws dug into their shoulders, pinning them to the ground as whatever had attacked them perched its entire weight atop them. The hunter cried out, hands scrambling to grab onto their assailant's wrists. They were met with coarse, dense fur, the skin underneath burning hot to the touch.

The hunter's mind reeled as they forced themself to look up. The werewolf on top of them snarled, teeth glinting mere inches from the hunter's face. Its breath fanned across their face, hot and stifling, its growl reverberating inside the hunter's own ribcage with its intensity. A pair of glinting eyes stared them down, filled with frightening intelligence and unfathomable rage.

The hunter didn't get the chance to react as those teeth flashed before their eyes, burying themselves in the soft flesh between their neck and shoulder. The hunter wailed, red hot agony lancing across their entire body as the werewolf only tightened its grip and began to shake them around violently. Its claws had dislodged themselves from the hunter's body, allowing it to drag them bodily across the ground like they weighed nothing at all, smearing blood and saliva on the grey concrete.

The hunter screamed as the muscles in their shoulder tore apart and their shoulder dislocated, clawing at the werewolf's face in a desperate attempt to make it let go. The werewolf only dragged them under itself again, letting go for only a moment before biting down again, claws raking across the hunter's body.

The hunter's screams filled the empty warehouse until the echoes became indisinguishable from the sound itself.

And then, suddenly, it all stopped.

The werewolf finally let go just as the hunter though it might tear their arm off completely, its weight disappearing just as suddenly as it had pinned them.

The hunter lay there in agony, ragged sobs and shallow breaths making their head swim. There was a constant, high pitched ringing in their ears, evident in the sudden absence of the werewolf's snarling growls.

And then that ringing stopped as well, tapering off into a... a wolf whistle, coming from the direction of the vampire, right where the hunter had left them.

The hunter forced themself to turn their head, watching with terrified eyes as the vampire stood up from where they had been dropped. Once they were steady on their feet, they turned to look at the hunter's fallen form, expression filled with grim satisfaction.

Nothing remained of the scared, defenseless prey animal that had lured the hunter in so easily. It was like they were looking at a whole different person.

The werewolf hovered near them, eyes fixated on the hunter. Blood matted in the fur of its canine muzzle, and it held the hunter's gaze as it slowly and deliberately licked its lips clean.

The vampire took a moment to yank the arrow from between their ribs- and that was that. They massaged the spot as if it was nothing more than a pulled muscle, holding the arrow out casually for the werewolf to sniff. The werewolf did, pulling a face like it was disgusted.

Then it spoke.

"They thought they could bring you down with only one arrow?"

The vampire chuckled, running a hand along the top of the werewolf's head. "And a dagger. Let's be fair now."

The werewolf rolled its eyes, and it was all the hunter could do to not lose their mind then and there.

"Really, love," the vampire cooed, cradling the werewolf's enormous face in both hands, "you can stop with the theatrics now. My brave guard dog, coming to my rescue."

The werewolf's tongue darted out to lick at the vampire's nose, lips curling into a canine smile. "Did you see the look on their face? Oh, it was priceless." Then, after a moment of consideration, "I really like this one."

The vampire's fond expression turned sour and it was their turn to roll their eyes. "Oh, please. They're a dime a dozen. Except this one might be even more irritating than the rest."

The hunter flinched when the vampire's gaze settled on them, eyes raking over their mangled body without the barest hint of empathy. Like they were a bug, about to be squashed under the vampire's heel.

The werewolf followed their gaze, and the hunter could feel panic beginning to claw its way up their throat as their eyes were forced to meet. The burning agony of their torn arm and shoulder flared to life again, demanding their attention. They were losing blood, too much blood. They would not survive another attack.

But the werewolf didn't move to attack. Instead, its body began to shift and change.

Its previously quadruped stance turned into a bipedal one as it stood up on its hind legs, height rapidly diminishing until it stood tall about a foot above the vampire. Its fur seemed to recede into its body, canine features smoothing into something more human-like, claws and teeth and wagging tail disappearing in a matter of seconds.

It was nothing like what the hunter had been expecting. All those tales of painful, grueling transformations, of snapping bones and tearing muscles and agonized howls mistaken to be those of wolves' - had they all been lies? For what purpose?

By the end, the werewolf hardly looked anything other than human. It- they? Stood tall for a human, and their eyes retained their unnatural luminosity, but other than that, there was no way to tell what they might have once been.

All except for one, tiny detail; their face remained covered in the hunter's drying blood.

From nose to chin and down their neck, the darkening blood served as a stark reminder of just what the hunter was dealing with here.

"There you are, love." The vampire said, placing a hand on the werewolf's cheek, which the latter leaned into gratefully.

"I really, really do like this one." The werewolf murmured, both hands coming up to hold onto and brush against the vampire's wrist. Their eyes softened, looking pleadingly at the vampire from under their eyelashes- a commendable feat, considering it was the vampire who had to look up in order for their eyes to meet.

The hunter averted their eyes. It felt... wrong for them to witness the scene, even under the circumstances. They felt, absurdly, like they were intruding on something private.

The vampire sighed wearily, but whatever internal struggle they had to put up lasted for only a moment. "I never could say no to you."

The hunter's stomach dropped at the words. They should have felt relieved- it meant they wouldn't be killed, right? But if *this* is what the werewolf did to the things they liked... the hunter didn't dare to think of the alternative.

They jumped at the sound of approaching footsteps- one pair loud and purposeful, and the other near silent. Bare feet shuffling along the concrete.

The hunter turned their head again, withering glare locked and loaded. The vampire caught their gaze first, neutral expression shifting into a dark, entirely self-satisfied smirk.

"I told you you would regret coming after me."

[prouvaireafterdark]

Hi! As someone just coming into reading the books but who's been with the show since day 1, I'm curious about why people take Lestat's narrative in TVL with 100% sincerity when the premise of the show seems to be interrogating the dissonance that everybody's versions create. Obviously there's some big things that are definitely going to be true, but I'd personally be disappointed if we got a straight adaptation of unfiltered Lestat perspective on events, haha!

I think you're conflating sincerity with some idea of omniscient, objective accuracy, which, as you note, is a useless thing to search for in a show where memory is continually shown to be an unreliable monster.

Lestat's version of events in TVL is sincere, though. He's speaking from the heart and he's trying to give the story of his life, mostly by sharing his truth about what his life before meeting Louis was like, and in part by filling in the gaps Louis leaves us with about what happened at Rue Royale. His recollection may turn out to be as faulty and biased as Louis' or Armand's has been shown to be in the show, but that doesn't make it any less sincere.

And I'm not implying that Louis is lying or anything. I'm talking about him not mentioning or glossing over the happy memories that meant a lot to Lestat and made up, for him, a big part of what it was to share a home with Louis and Claudia for so long. Giving Lestat the space to talk about his love for Louis and Claudia doesn't erase the abuse he inflicted on them in those moments of instability and rage. I don't get why people are so resistant to seeing that. It's not like it makes everything better. If anything, it makes it worse that he loved them so much.

What's important to note, too, is that at no point does Lestat in his retelling excuse himself for anything he did to Louis and Claudia and I doubt very much we would see him do that in future seasons of the show. Lestat even says it himself that he deserved what Claudia did to him. The way things worked out between the three of them is his greatest, deepest regret and it will haunt him for the rest of his immortal life.

Also, not for nothing, what we've gotten this season and last season are the unfiltered perspectives of Louis, Claudia, and Armand. That's not to say they're lying or intentionally obfuscating (okay, well, Armand totally is), but that is what we got---a narrative that was really challenged only by Daniel and not by anyone who was actually there who remembers it differently. I don't see why we shouldn't also get Lestat's unfiltered version, especially considered he is the main protagonist of the Vampire Chronicles series going forward.

For me and many others, it's not about excusing anything. It's all about contextualizing his decisions. Like, Lestat didn't just wake up one day and decide it would be fun to destroy his family. I want him to tell me in his own words (which, as a reminder, he has yet to do at any point in this series so far) what drove him to do the horrible things he did and how he really feels about it. When we do hopefully get that, I expect the fandom to interrogate his accounts as vigorously as they did Louis' and Armand's and Claudia's.

And to answer your question regarding the books specifically, we have Anne herself to blame for that. She wrote IWTV when she was battling some of the most intense grief and despair a person can feel. She had just lost her child. Writing the book was an outlet for that and you can feel it as you read Louis' perspective. When she decided to continue the series, though, she changed her mind about a lot of things---mainly who Lestat was as a character and how she had come to hate the "weakness" in Louis (which was really because she came to hate the "weakness" she saw in herself as she came out on the other side of her grief and identified with him less and Lestat more). There is a very real dissonance between who Lestat is in IWTV and who he is in TVL and beyond. The way she accounted for that in her own writing was that Louis was misconstruing certain events by leaving things out or straight up making things up like their reunion in NOLA at the end of IWTV, which Lestat claims never happened. The reason people take Lestat's words at face value sometimes isn't usually because they hate Louis or think he lied about Lestat's abuse. It's because Anne, as the writer of the story, wanted the reader to doubt Louis' version in favor of Lestat's because she had changed her mind about the direction of the story and the characters she created.

It's also worth noting that, in the actual text of the show, that version of events taken from the book, the content of the original interview, is described by Louis himself as an admitted performance. I think it's a perfectly legitimate reading to consider IWTV (the book) in the context of Louis trying to get Lestat's attention with something he knew would upset him, like Armand suggests was Louis' fantasy, because he wanted or needed to see him again.

This got long and rambley so I'll just leave you with the wise, wise words of Samothy Reid when asked to give one truth and one lie in the show: Everybody lies. Everybody lies.

I don't think that will change if we finally get Lestat's POV so imo people should just relax and enjoy the ride.

[so-what-then]

When you've never watched nor read gothic horror ever:

[thequeenofsastiel]

It's a real pity to think about the fact that Spike must constantly smell like cigarette smoke.

[moistvonlipwig]

"in what world was angel buffy's abuser" ummm in the one where s2 of buffy the vampire slayer aired????? or are we still pretending that was his alter ego countess boochie flagrante even though he himself certainly doesn't think so

[like-tears-in-rain-storms]

Hot take

You can gauge how much creative liberty Robert Eggers was granted in each movie by whether there are penises present.

[kinda-stav]

Get ur cloaks and fangs, girlies!!

We're dressing up for Nosferatu like we did for Barbie