#you can be lestat and have the intention of saving both claudia and louis (according to jacob) but what does that intention matter if you

[flintsilvers]

btw i think armand probably thought he could save louis some other way and lestat just beat him to it. like theres absolutely no reason to believe armand wanted louis dead/would choose the coven over him. ultimately it doesnt really matter tho bc he wanted claudia dead and he got that, he wanted to leave the coven with louis and he got that too

[toriangeli]

I get the impression that the writers didn’t expect people to be that invested in Armand which is odd bc he’s a popular book character but. It almost seems to me like they thought everyone would be invested in Lestat and Louis only and they can do whatever with Armand. I still think he was well-written for the most part don’t get me wrong. However.

I think his motivations are muddled in this version of the story and it’s weird that he had no strong relationships to anyone all season. The Louis thing didn’t matter to either of them that much bc he was willing to let him die (weird), nothing with Daniel yet, didn’t seem very upset with the coven members dying and didn’t even seem to hate Claudia all that much?

I feel like they didn't think we'd love him if he was as much of a maniac as he was in the books? Crazy time to start worrying about what their audience thinks. ffs, Rolin talked about how bad they felt for Armand upon rereading the second half of book 1 and then didn't even quote the line that made them feel so bad for him in the first place (the thing about how he's done everything for Louis and Louis doesn't love him and seems totally dead to him).

He was definitely very attached to Louis, but Louis' lack of attachment to him and Daniel's utter contempt guided the audience's opinion a lot more than the softening of his terribleness. Even if it's not their intent, he comes across as the least favorite child. Lestat dropped Louis from the sky and gets a pass, but Armand did...what, exactly? Louis forgave him for playing a part with Claudia's death, but being willing to let Louis die was unforgivable, even after he pulled Louis out of the sun? And Rolin talked about how these were genuine attempts from Armand to be better, to be good to Louis, only to be met in 2.05 with the bleak understanding that none of it meant jack shit to Louis, it was all just a sign of Armand being a boring person who did boring things. "As empathetic as possible," says Rolin, but the actual audience is taking its cues from audience surrogate Daniel, whose opinion isn't based on Armand's experiences or even Louis' experiences, but his own. His entire take on the situation is centered around what Armand did to him, so he ignores anything that could actually make him see where Armand is coming from. He even calls his tragic backstory into question. And don't tell me Armand lied so much he deserved that. Nobody deserves it. Anyway, according to Rolin, Armand lied about two things: who saved Louis at the trial, and how involved he was in the trial itself, and all subsequent lies were covering up those two. Do you ever see Armand bringing up his tragic backstory when he isn't asked to do so? He plays victim about other things, sure, but never about that.

And frankly, some of the things he plays victim about, he has the right to be pissed about. It feels like nobody really grasps 2.05 with any sense of compassion for both Louis and Armand--it's always one or the other of them in total wrong. Either Louis is emotionally abusive during their fight, or Armand tortured and neglected him and made the whole situation about himself.

What if both things can be true, but we understand where they're both coming from? That's the thing about dark fiction: we can actually look critically at relationships like these and see nuance. It's not safe to do that in real life unless you're the therapist involved, but in fiction? We can actually look and see and think. Don't do that if you're in a toxic relationship irl, just get out.

Louis is using drugs to run away from something Armand could have prevented. There's kind of a karma in Armand being forced to be his caretaker. At the same time, I know what being the codependent in a relationship feels like, so...yes, Armand making the situation about himself makes a lot of sense because no situation is ever about himself. He drags Louis out of the sun, and we never talk about how traumatic that is for both of them. Rightly, the focus is on Louis, because Louis is the primary victim in the situation, but he's not the only one traumatized by his own suicide attempt. We, the audience, have the capacity to have empathy for them both, but we seldom do. Instead, we see Armand doing something wrong--the secondary victim demanding understanding from the primary one--and focus way too much on that instead of why.

People feel sorry for themselves because they're overcompensating for the fact that only they ever seem to validate their own experiences. Judging by some of Sam's attitude, I suspect the last person who told Armand "you went through something fucked up and it's okay to not be okay about it" was Marius. Right before the attempt, Louis actively invalidated some of the worst shit Armand ever went through, so sure. I obviously don't agree with Armand's actions in the aftermath, but the important thing is, I'd consider it shitty, shitty writing if the writers decided everyone should immediately be able to act rationally about this. That's not how people work. It's the opposite of how Armand should work. Armand is so poorly socialized, he doesn't know the unwritten social codes, or even why he does what he does. And any time someone calls him out, they can't seem to do so without invalidating completely unrelated traumas he's had.

You can say, "Oh, well, this season was Louis' story, so of course they focused on Louis' perspective," but here's the problem with that: we are not getting a The Vampire Armand season. It wouldn't make sense. The only two main characters who are in those flashbacks are Armand and Marius. That means sidelining almost every series regular for an entire season if they did a TVA season. If every POV character (Daniel, Louis, and Lestat) has total contempt for Armand, exactly when is the audience supposed to have things cleared up for them?

[ladycatofwinterfell]

I know I’m making these posts for an audience of one (1) person and that person is me. But I like writing it out, it’s easier to make sense of all my thoughts and impressions that way. And it will give me something to look back on ahead of or during next season.

And so here it is. Thoughts on episode 8.

Maybe this time I’ll start with what I didn’t like and then do it more or less chronologically. Yeah, let’s do it that way.

The episode felt kinda… idk, clunky to me? It feels like maybe some things would have benefited from being a little more drawn out. And with that I’m especially thinking of the Louis/Armand divorce. After their fight in ep.5 I guess I was expecting more at the reveal that caused the end of their relationship. Something even more explosive. Or an actual confrontation. Though I guess we’ve been slowly seeing their relationship fall apart during the season and this was just the very last thing that cemented the end of it. I also would have liked more of Louis burning down the theatre. The cut between the New Orleans scene and Daniel's tv appearance was also a little abrupt for my taste.

The thing with Armand wanting Louis dead kinda annoyed me at first because it just straight up doesn’t make any sense for me. It just felt evil. It might be the bias that I went in expecting his motivation to be the same as in the books that brought this feeling out in me, but I really wanted that. He wanted Claudia dead so he could have Louis, it was never his intention for both of them to die. Though after a couple of rewatches I'm more willing to accept it. Armand seems to desire stability and reassurance and at that point in their relationship Louis could not promise him that. He refused to join the coven and was actively agitating members of it, which brought danger to Armand. He could not trust Louis to stay with him in the long run and so he chose his coven of 200 years. And when he realised it was not going according to plan he improvised in the hope of that he would land on top. And he did. And so I choose to trust them on this decision for now in the hopes of the next season giving more clarity. This season left Armand’s character in a similar place that Lestat was left in last season, the place as the villain in the story. This season gave nuance to Lestat without changing all of the bad things he did last season. And I hope the same will be true for Armand. And if it isn't I'll take the evil gremlin. I don't hate the evil gremlin. Armand <3

NOW! Good things. Because there are a lot of them. I saw that some people didn't really like this ep and while I consider it the weakest of the season it's still great. So let's talk about it.

Louis' monologue at the beginning of the episode is so good. Jacob Anderson is so good. I've fallen in love with both Louis and Jacob and it's all due to this wonderful performance. Wondering what he could have done differently to avoid ever falling for Lestat and reaching the conclusion that it was inevitable. There was no version of events where he didn't kiss Lestat on the altar (loooooove that they've leaned into the wedding implications of that in both this ep and ep 7). And so there was no version of event where all this could have been avoided, it was inevitable. He's probably right, it was inevitable, and that's part of the tragedy babey! And Claudia is dead. Claudia doesn't exist any longer. Her absence this episode is so striking. While it's all about her she's not truly there and there's a gaping hole where she was before.

His manic planning was also just beautifully acted. And it paired with Dubai scenes of Louis and Armand being like noooo Daniel you don't understand Armand was also a victim :( we prooooomise :( and Daniel just quietly waiting for when he can drop what he's discovered. Seeing Louis burn down the theatre was so satisfying. Setting fire to those who had wronged not him but Claudia and saving her things from that fire. Taking the last physical remains of her and committing murder with them in his bag <3 him knowing he can get Santiago by agitating and mocking him. and saying come to me???????? iwtv writers what the fuck were you on because I want some. All through the season I've been just a little in love with Santiago because of Ben Daniels' incredible performance and the fun pizzazz he brought to the character. With that said I was happy to watch him die after he said the most disgusting thing I have ever heard in my life about Claudia's ashes. Burn in hell bitch. All love to Ben Daniels though.

The scene with Armand afterwards? Where Armand admits to lying but not about that he played an active role in it? He knows he can't deny that he knew it would happen, but he knows he can deny it was largely due to him. Giving him a little of the truth, a bit he's carefully curated, just enough for it to be believable? Excellent.

LESTAT DE LIONCOURT!!! For now we'll just go with that I was wrong and that Lestat was chilling out in the dungeon out of his own free will (even though I still suspect we'll hear a different version later on. and if we don't and that was the truth i'm fine with it). Louis going to him with full intent of killing him that time, of burning him for what he did to Claudia. For crossing an ocean to rehearse a play that would burn his daughter alive. Big fan of them reversing to Claudia being their daughter btw. While she wanted to be their sister, while they called her their sister she never was their sister. That was their daughter. That was their little girl, as tragic as that is. Anyhow. He can't burn Lestat because Lestat has the blood of Akasha in him (Akasha mention let's fucking go). He can't kill Lestat. But he has to hurt him, he NEEDS to hurt him. And so he hurts him by being with Armand. I'm a big believer in that Louis and Armand really did love each other in the beginning and that their relationship was genuinely built on a connection. But that changes in Magnus' tower. That's when Armand becomes the rebound, that's when he becomes the companion Louis kept out of spite because he could not hurt Lestat in any other way then and there.

End of story. Armand breaths a sigh of relief, even allows himself to gloat a little. Too bad for him that Daniel is out for blood and is just itching to bring down his empire of lies. He points out flaws in Louis' story. He points out inconsistencies. And then he slams down the scrips for the trial that has Armand's notes scribbled in the margins. Because it was Armand. Armand had an active role in it. Armand wanted him and Claudia dead. Lestat saved Louis at the trial, and he didn't look very healthy in that version. He looked pale, he looked like the swaying Lestat we saw briefly just before Claudia died. Love how in the version of the trial from the previous ep Lestat wears black while Armand wears white, and when we see them rehearsing it's the other way around. Anyway I fell completely for that it was Armand that saved Louis, I believed it because that's what happened in the book, but it was a nice twist that it was Lestat. I think Sam Reid said he believes Lestat would have saved Claudia if he had had the energy for it, but he was simply not well enough to use his powers to save them both. Cool, doesn't at all make me want to die. Daniel lives for the drama, I'm here for it. His dramatic reveal was incredible. Louis snaps, as one might do when one finds out one's partner of 77 years murdered one's daughter and then fucked with one's head so one can't remember the truth of it. Him throwing Armand into the wall where the paintings were before but that they left bare because they couldn't agree on what to put up there? Fucking poetry.

Louis getting his accent back when he leaves Dubai is so beautiful. He lived in that grey and soulless apartment, spoke in a way that wasn't his own, wore only black. And now he's in New Orleans. He goes on a little tour that includes part of his own life and smiles at the incorrect things said like he's fondly reminiscing about it. And he is. He might have told a story that wasn't entirely how it actually happened in the interview, but it helped him to process some very painful things. It led him to come to terms with it in a way that he simply couldn't before. And now he's treated like a respected person, not looked down upon the way he was when he left New Orleans. And he sees a vampire catching rats, and he follows that vampire.

Okay so let’s get to the elephant in the room. The Louis/Lestat scene. Because while my first thought was Louis, girl, GET UP!! I really enjoyed the scene. Out of everything in the episode that one hit the hardest and how could it not? I’ve already come out as a loustat enjoyer, you know how it is (this show is very much not about shipping for me, but it’s also built on the relationships between all characters and loustat is simply THE relationship). He follows the young vampire and finds a Lestat that's a shadow of his former self. He returned to New Orleans because New Orleans is his home, but he hasn't been living there. He says he has, but that wasn't a life. He's been punishing himself ever since Paris, lived in atonement for what he did. He denies himself everything. Eats rats, lives in a shack, wears the robe he wore the first night he and Louis spent together, he even denies himself the joy of playing the piano. AND THIS IS THE FIRST TIME WE SEE LESTAT!!!! this is the first time we see Lestat in the flesh and not through someone's memory of him. And he's the most pathetic wet dog of a man you've ever laid eyes on. Gone is the grandiose personality and the seductive presence. He's just so sad. And he has an ipad. Who gave this man wifi??? and taught him to use siri???? I was taken off guard by siri pause, it was very funny. And while it wasn't the same tone as the rest of the scene it worked. Shows we're in the presence, grounds the scene in, idk, realism? Like it's not a big thing, a great happening, it takes place in the real world. With that said it is a great happening and I’ll be thinking about it for the rest of my life. The way Sam and Jacob acted the entire scene is so great (as always with those two). The initial gentleness from Louis at seeing what has become of Lestat. Lestat being a very miserable and watered down version of himself but not without a lot of the same mannerisms as before (the way he moves his head when talking, his little shoulder shimmy, the way he drums his hand against his board). I like Lestat holding the board in front of him like a shield until they get to the point where Louis asked why he didn't say that he saved his life in Paris. And Lestat questioning if it was saving him. Louis thanking Lestat for the gift of time is sooooo touching. He wore vampirism like a curse, couldn't accept it, but he's come to realise that the nights he has ahead of him means something. He can use those nights to learn to live honestly. And it truly is beautiful that after having seen Louis struggle with vampirism for two seasons that he can embrace his own nature in a different way and consider it something positive that he has eternity to do right by himself and others. And Lestat, upon hearing that, asking about if he tried to end his life in 1973. If it was truly so bad he hurt himself. Which ties very well into his doubts about if he truly did save Louis in Paris. And he's clearly spent a lot of time thinking about this because he remembers the exact date and the exact time, both in New Orleans and in San Fransisco, when he heard from Armand. And that's the only time he's heard about Louis since they left Paris!! More than 70 years and all he knows of Louis is that something terrible happened to him in 1973. And when Louis says he was lost he immediately brings up Claudia, because of course it's about Claudia. He can't stop thinking about her either. And perhaps this (apart from the unbreakable vampire bond) is what will always tie Louis and Lestat together from now on. That they are the only two people in the world that understand the loss of Claudia and that knew the joy of Claudia when they lived together in New Orleans. No one else fully understands their pain. Lestat blames himself for the trial, Louis blames himself for the turning of Claudia in the first place. Both of them think themselves partly responsible for her death. And in a way they are, but they didn't mean for that to happen and it will haunt them for the rest of their lives.

New paragraph because Tumblr forbid me from having one that long. It's the first time that has ever happened to me. Cool, I love this show. Anyway Louis heard from Armand that Claudia looked to Lestat in her last moment, but now he hears it from Lestat. He hears Lestat say she looked at him like he was her father, and then try to continue by saying he never was her father but the thing is that he was!! They were always her fathers. She referred to him as her uncle until she refused to be anything but a grown sister, but he was always her father. That was their daughter. Even when things were bad, even when she resented and hated them (especially Lestat), even when she tried to kill Lestat. Claudia was their daughter. In her last moment she did look to her father. The father that didn't save her. Side note, if they do "Claudia was my dark child, my love, evil of my evil. Claudia broke my heart" next season I'll die, I think. Claudia and Lestat are so interesting, character dynamic of all time if I'm being honest. Anyway they hug and it's such a relief for both Louis and Lestat. Finally they're embracing each other, sharing some comfort about Claudia's death, which is something they've both been denied for an entire human lifetime. And there's a storm going on around them, it sounds like the house will fall apart. 1 "Another round in the stormy romance of you two" and 2 "I was just a roof shingle that flew off of your house". Nothing is about Claudia because everything is about the two of them and it's always been that way, but simultaneously everything is about Claudia. And it's so deliciously tragic that everything becomes about her only after she dies. She could not be that while she was alive, she had to die for them to realise that. Just as with Claudia and Madeleine I love that we can't hear what they're saying to each other, again that's not for us to know. It's just for the two of them. Jacob and Sam deserve to have that.

And on a completely different note VAMPIRE DANIEL!!!! I saw him wearing sunglasses indoors and was like wait a moment... and then I saw his nails and YES he's a vampire!! Sad they've already burned half of my wishlist for season 3, but I can't be too upset about it. Daniel upon becoming a vampire immediately returning to his annoying and rash and twitchy 20-year-old self is gold. Becoming dated in his leather jacket and acdc shirt the same way Lestat became in his silk cravats. He's an old man physically but a very young vampire and it shows as soon as we see him. He's cocky and seems to think himself invincible, proudly proclaiming for all that will listen that vampires exist. I saw people upset that his turning was off screen but I like it. We know what's implied, we can definitely imagine approximately what took place after Louis told Armand not to touch Daniel. DID I HEAR MAITRE ONLY WHEN IT'S HOT OR CONVENIENT??? I'm a strong believer in that we'll get devil's minion, only in a different format than the one in the books, I'm not willing to give up on it. Louis and Daniel's relationship continuing is great though, and Daniel calling Armand an asshole wasn't bad either. Daniel pushing for more books because he's high on everything and on top of life. Great idea to make an addict into a creature whose entire existence revolves around the next fix.

Louis wears patterns now! He has a yellow couch! There are flowers on a table and a colourful painting on the wall! Claudia's dress is up on the wall, as is a portrait of Paul! The magnolia tree is gone, it's simply his little garden now. The apartment is his, he himself is his own. And the other vampires want to kill him for Daniel's book, and he lets them know they're welcome to try and fuck with him. Because he owns the night. When I saw him I was at first afraid of that Lestat would also be there with him, and I'm so glad he wasn't. I'm so glad that for now Louis is on his own, learning to live with himself and be himself again. I'm so glad that it ended with the focus on only him. Jacob Anderson as Louis de Pointe du Lac, you will always be famous. Also relieved it's been at least partly confirmed that while Lestat will narrate next season Louis will not take a step back, it's still also about him. I love Louis <3