#we got devils minion DANIEL IS ARMANDS ONLY FLEDGLING I WILL NEVER GET OVER THIS

[funtheysaid]

That’s got to be the best, most insane, most satisfying, MOST FASCINATING season finale I’ve ever watched in my life. Holy fuck.

[wizardpink]

I screencapped these two posts four days ago because I had Something to Say and now I have no idea wth it was.

I think it had something to do with power dynamics and how Armand making Daniel a vampire actually handed Daniel a huge amount of power over Armand despite being the fledgling?

So number one Armand rendered his primary weapon against Daniel / form of self-defense completely useless by making Daniel his fledgling. He can no longer use the mind gift to manipulate Daniel or erase his memories. Which of course is true for all makers and fledglings, but most makers' fledglings aren't Sherlock Holmes with a BSJ. Daniel beat Armand's mental saw trap as a human. Armand is never, never getting one over on him now. Daniel will perceive the slightest change in energy coming from Armand and immediately know that he's lying, and 3 seconds of deduction later and he'll know why. He's an open book now, which must be terrifying.

Number two: mentorship. This is how Lestat kept control over Claudia and Louis for so long: he kept them dependent on him through ignorance. He only told them enough about vampirism to get through the day to day: don't go in the sun, don't drink dead blood, the other vampires of the world are vicious, etc. Every fledging needs their maker at LEAST in the beginning to teach them the ropes. Well, Daniel just wrote the goddamned book on vampirism, literally. Daniel sat there and listened as Louis told him everything he knew, everything Lestat ever taught him, everything Armand ever taught him. What other vampire ever got the in-depth two week course on Vampires 101 before they even got turned?! Crazy stuff.

Number three: vampire loneliness. Supposedly the most cruel and painful thing a vampire can endure. It keeps fledglings and makers tied to each other well past the point of being able to stand each other. And god knows Armand is staring down the barrel of having no one but Daniel. Which is unfortunate for him, considering Daniel is besties with his ex husband and touring with his ex boyfriend. Daniel has friends, friends that didn't torture him for 4 days then try to kill him. Oof.

All of this is to say that, with the info we have right now, Daniel has very little need for Armand. Armand in comparison needs him at least not to be alone, but what leverage does he have to get Daniel to stay with him? He's got nothing babes. I'm not a strong believer in the Armand is running from Daniel theory on season 3, but if he is, it's hard to blame him. He is shooting 0 for 1,000 right now, losing left and right, dying of shame and guilt and embarrassment. I'd probably crawl in a hole and die too.

"Oh but wizardpink, that's not very Devil's Minion of you!" AU CONTRAIRE. Because what could be more compelling and romantic than someone who has no use for you but nevertheless wants you? Thinks about you constantly and doesn't know why? You tried to capture them in a glass jar but they broke out and flew away, only to flutter back because they missed you? Yeah inject that straight into my veins.

And on the flip side? Maybe Armand goes straight back to that headspace he was in in '73, the crazed look in his eyes when he told Daniel he was going to teach him to be fascinating. That's ONE thing Armand still has on Daniel, he could probably overpower him enough to keep him trapped somewhere, if Armand thought Daniel was going to leave him. This, too, is Devil's Minion as fuck. Slowest of burns, as they say.

Hmm. Yeah I guess that was what I was gonna say.

[artandhijinks]

I'm going to kind of do a follow up post to this one and this one to address some issues that have been brought up in comments, tags and reblogs. I've also received quite a bit of hateful and abusive anonymous ask and they will be shut off until further noticed because the internet cannot be trusted.

Yes, the criticism that Claudia the female character of color has no agency of her own is valid. But here's a quick history lesson. Due to the time period she would be considered Louis's ward/property until she found a husband. Then she would be considered his ward/property. Because women weren't even allowed the right to vote until 1920 and in fact, in banks were legally allowed to deny unmarried women their own bank account until 1974. So women were still technically financially dependent on their husband until 1974. Now she probably could have got married even though she was 14. My own grandmother got married at 14 in 1959. But there is no way that's going to fly in a TV show in this day and age. And we have a book to follow plot wise and this is just the treatment of women. The treatment of people of color is even worse. So I get where this complaint is coming from? And it's even worse the further back in history you go. However I would like to add more diversity to this story. That's why I'm really rooting for a lot of race swapping when it makes historical sense. But I still think you guys are looking at this the wrong way. Here me out

The modern day part of the story is going to be the make or break point. Not what happens in the past. It's going to be the modern day. But we don't know what's going on in the modern day. As long as the characters of color now have agency can stand up to their abusive makers. That is what matters. Now for the Louis and Lestat relationship, if they were human that's an abusive relationship. Get out of there but they are vampires. They have eternity to work on themselves and to try to change and work this out. The same thing goes for Daniel and Armand. Do you think the devil's minion when Armand basically stalks Daniel all over the globe and gets him addicted to his blood is healthy. But again we don't fully know what's going on in the modern day.

But I can tell you to justify them staying together and being the end game ship even though they were toxic in the past in the modern day, both Louis and Lestat are going to have to have a relationship with healthy boundaries and Daniel and Armand are in the same boat. Now I love the devil's minion and I'm totally looking forward to this being explored in both the past and its full unhealthy crazy toxic form and the modern day in hopefully a healthier form. But old man Daniel is definitely going to have to lay down some boundaries otherwise they're going to go down the same road as Louis and Lestat did in the past. If they are not at that point yet they need to be at least working to that point. Where they can have healthy boundaries. This is going to be a learning curve for everyone involved.

And as for the changes to Marius's fledglings that I've mentioned earlier. Here is what I would like for them in the modern day.

Let's start with Pandora I would like her to be Indian. Living somewhere far away from Marius. In the books she refuses to be in the same room with him The only exception was when they had to take down Akasha. So this would include her blocking him in every form possible and never contacting him again completely ignoring his existence. She hasn't seen him since he stood her up and he she's never looked back. I ship her with Gabrielle. They've both survived abusive husbands that have treated them like property and an extension of themselves. They wouldn't try to control each other and would probably be living off somewhere in the woods. She wouldn't care that Gabrielle sleeps in the dirt every day and would occasionally just disappear for a little while but she'd always come back her. She would pick up hobbies related to Indian culture because she probably never really learned anything about it until Marius stood her up and she decided to never look back, even though that's the culture of her mother. I could see her getting really good at some of those Indian embroidery techniques where they use actual gold thread or glass/mirrors beads. That just seems like a vampire hobby. It's super detailed and requires a ridiculous amount of time and effort to master again. It seems like a vampire hobby

Then we have Bianca. I mentioned before Venice at the time of the Renaissance had a large African and ottoman Muslim population simply because it was one of the largest and busiest ports in the world at the time. Doesn't this sound a lot like a Renaissance New Orleans? I'm beginning to see some similarities here And it's mentioned somewhere that Marius might have made her because she looked a lot like Pandora. So there's the reason to go ottoman. I would prefer they go African. From what I can tell with my research, the African and ottoman population we're part of just about every social class. This did include slaves but also had indentured servants, the working class and some wealthy merchants. But I would want her to be living her best life somewhere in Africa. Maybe the Caribbean. Far away from Marius if she's African learning everything she can about whatever part of Africa she believes she's from. Again reclaiming that culture that was taken from her. Have her pick up a hobby we know Marius taught most of his fledglings how to paint in the traditional Renaissance style. I could see her being petty and now learning as many of the traditional African crafts to preserve them. Because she's immortal and some of these traditions are at risk of dying out, so they would be preserved with her all she has to do is find someone to teach every few decades. She would be slightly more hospitable if Marius calls asking for something but she still would have no problem telling him to go to go screw himself if she doesn't want to help him do whatever he needs help with

Then we have Armand. Not only does he have Marius to recover from, he also has the satanic cult and all that brainwashing recover from. And can someone correct me if I'm wrong but if I remember correctly didn't he believe if Marius was dead up until Queen of the Damned? He's the one that is going to struggle the most with boundaries when it comes to Marius thinking he was dead combined with severe Stockholm syndrome and all the grooming. But he also has Daniel if they can have a healthy relationship at that point. Daniel would have no problem advocating on his behalf when it comes to Marius. We know he has no problem telling very powerful vampires exactly what he thinks even if it might get him killed. If him and Daniel are not in a good place at this point. Louis would also have no problem helping Armand. They may not be an endgame ship, but they are still good friends

So yes, in the past these characters probably will have little agency in the past. That's just how history was women and people of color were treated as second class citizens at best more commonly they were treated as property. They're going to have to be very careful how they show the past abuse and mistreatment these characters go through. But as long as they have found their agency in the present day. I think we are in a good place.

But I do think this is the direction they're heading at least for Marius and his fledgling since I do think it's highly unlikely David is going to be in the show unless they want to make him a villain cuz I think that's the only way to do it. But that trigger the book purest worse than they already are. So some of his bad traits like the whole colonizer issue are going to Marius because it would be super easy to do it because he's the literal embodiment of western civilization as a Roman philosopher. That leaves the other non-problematic parts of his story going to Daniel they've already set this up by aging him up.

[hekateinhell]

you probably got this question before, but how do you think daniel would react to TVA?

I don't think I have actually, but I sure do talk about it a lot!

I think the implication in QotD when Daniel (half dead and barely lucid) is tearing through TVL for any mention of Armand is that all this is brand new information to him. Armand doesn't exactly have the compulsion to share, so it's possible all Daniel knew up until then was what Louis had told him and whatever little superficial tidbits here and there Armand had slipped him over the course of twelve years.

Since TVA is set two years before B&G and there's probably more distance between the time Anne actually wrote the two, I don't know that she thought ahead enough about Daniel to consider his mental state during the TVA period as Armand is narrating. Anne was not Daniel's biggest fan (when she remembered he existed at all). So the way I think of it is that Armand wouldn't have known Daniel had delved into insanity at this point.

My personal headcanon based off of that is that Armand decided to share his story for the same reason Lestat did--to reach out to the fledgling who'd left him. Only Armand is less of "now this is what really happened, also I'm sorry," and more of "this is why it happened, here is everything you wanted to know," with an extra dose of bitterness sprinkled in since the wound is a only few years fresh vs several decades. Of course, this is purely fanon (see my point about Anne re: Daniel 🥲).

So I always think Daniel got to read TVA after his recovery, about 10 or so years after it would've been published. I imagine he felt lots of things! Delighted to finally learn more about Armand in his own words, devastated at the details of his life's story, frustrated that Armand never actually shared any of this with him during their time together, bitter over the way Armand describes their relationship. In Devil's Minion (as we presume Daniel is dictating to Lestat or vice versa) we don't get the sense that Armand is coming to their relationship from a place of anger and hatred at the world, as he says he was in TVA. Recklessness? Absolutely. Desperation? Probably, yes. But Armand being angry and hateful is not the read we generally get from QotD.

Ultimately, I like to think reading TVA was at least partially what motivated Daniel to give his relationship with Armand another go; it explained why Armand is the way that he is and his capacity and desire for love and forgiveness (see Marius, Santino, Lestat). If nothing else, it gave them something to talk about when they were first reconciling.