Is it selfish of me to want some exploration/acknowledgement of how show-armands casting as a South Asian man affects his character?
I remember watching an analysis on how well the first seasons incorporated blackness into the narrative. It wasn't just a race-swap; louis' blackness became the key motivation behind his character, his suppressed rage and need to be seen made his turning so much more powerful than the standard 'don't you want to live forever?' shtick. You take that identity away from him and you'd have to rewrite the entire script. I would even go as far as to say it made iwtv better.
I know the show doesn't have the space to focus on Armand's identity to that extent, so i'm not too bothered, but.
rentboy, nicki's slur, bottom twink, ragdoll for hire, etc, etc. If you're going to mention all this anyways, can there be a little more to it?
I know this is not South-Asian exclusive. At this point of the show you could make armand white and you could argue it would largely stay the same* save for some insults switched around and, dare i say, have him be portrayed as more desirable like in the books. I almost wish this wasn't the case, I wish it was a race-adaption instead of a race-swap, because there's so much potential.
Everything about armands' story feels riddled with orientalist and colonialist themes. There's the historical association of south asian men as less masculine and feminized compared to their white counterparts, the simultaneous desire (exotic, youthful, novel) and ridicule (gremlin, monkey, dirty). Characters constantly humiliating and talking down to him, backhanded compliments because admitting that he could be desirable feels shameful so they have to take it out on the object instead. Marius' painting where his brown identity was stripped but the art was kept, because it sold better this way (scandinavian scarves, clean girl aesthetics, yoga). His complex view of his master as a rescuer, his relationship to religion, languages, names, ownership, identity, all colonialist themes.
And why not get geo-political with it? there's a wealth of detail that his background provides. Why not talk about Dehli's huge child trafficking problem that continues to this day? Or how his parents selling him could have been influenced by India's caste system? What was it like spending 400 years in a country with anti-Romani sentiment? How did Santiago, who existed during the period where India was under British rule, feel about having to answer to a brown man? Did it influence their dynamic at all? What about living in Dubai, a country built on slave labour?
So much potential. Obviously this can't all be fleshed out but the script definitely had room for a little self-awareness between the many, many, cases where we see armand grapple with these themes.
*ᴵ ᵃᶜᵗᵘᵃˡˡʸ ᵈᶦˢᵃᵍʳᵉᵉ ʷᶦᵗʰ ᵗʰᶦˢ ᵇᵉᶜᵃᵘˢᵉ ᴵ ᵗʰᶦⁿᵏ ᵗʰᵉʳᵉ'ˢ ᵃ ˡᵒᵗ ᵒᶠ ˢᵘᵇᶜᵒⁿˢᶜᶦᵒᵘˢ ʷᵉᶦᵍʰᵗ ᵃᵗᵗᵃᶜʰᵉᵈ ˢᵒᵘᵗʰ⁻ᵃˢᶦᵃⁿ ʳᵃᶜᶦˢᵐ ᵗʰᵃᵗ ᶦˢ ᵒᵛᵉʳˡᵒᵒᵏᵉᵈ ʳᶦᵍʰᵗ ⁿᵒʷ ᵃⁿᵈ ᵗʰᵃᵗ ʷᵉ ᵈᵒⁿ'ᵗ ʰᵃᵛᵉ ᵗʰᵉ ᶜᵒᵐᵐᵒⁿ ᵃʷᵃʳᵉⁿᵉˢˢ/ˡᵃⁿᵍᵘᵃᵍᵉ ᵗᵒ ᵈᵉˢᶜʳᶦᵇᵉ ʲᵘˢᵗ ʸᵉᵗ. ᵖᵒᶦⁿᵗ ˢᵗᶦˡˡ ˢᵗᵃⁿᵈˢ ʳᵉᵍᵃʳᵈˡᵉˢˢ.
