TVL after dark, I watch it so you donāt have to part 2
(Their reaction when Rolin talks smack about Louis)
This episode felt like a hostage situation.
The actors generally look like this (not all the time ofc) when Rolin or Hannah or the hostess speak
But whenever Jacob opens his mouth they all look at him like this... ugh I just wonder what went on behind closed doors.
Delainey, Assad and Sam all constantly look at Jacob - in my opinion looking for support, whenever they say something that might be perceived as critical ? Worrying but idk
Rolin mentions Claudia was at the long table AT FIRST but they removed herā¦ Assad speaks critical of that writing choice of Claudia not being at the long table in a PR speak kind of way where heās also praising it. He said itās very telling Claudia is missing. Sam supports Assads point and says Claudia should have been there (also pr speak), and Delainey seems to appreciate them both speaking up.
Sam is to the only one out of him Rolin and Hannah to take the sexual abuse of Lestat seriously.
Assad seems very unhappy with their choice for Armand and Loumand. See my other post, the host says at one point letās get into and Assad does this gesture and says āLetās leave it at that.ā (Not subtitled for some reason)
Jacob tries to defend Louis and his choices, Rolin interjects with some BS.. Delainey and Sam both looking to Jacob again like ?? U good?
Delainey doesnāt want to talk about Claudia or Regina and doesnāt say much, sheās very empathetic to them both as victims.
Assad, Sam, Delainey and Jacob seem to be on the same page and very comfortable around each other.
š these are the four artists who, in light of the most recent season, appear to have carried iwtv on their backs while the white showrunner got all the credit. very impressed with their work not just writing/directing/editing-wise but because their presence clearly set a certain tone in that writers' room. and i imagine it took quite a bit of effort to maintain it, considering what that writers' room turned into once they were no longer in the picture. i'm really excited to keep an eye on their careers and i hope they move on to do great things with more creative control
the other problem with lestat's hateful backlash to louis in tvl and the lack of any kind of proper contrition arc for what he's done to louis and claudia is that even if the show does have him regretting what he's done and apologizing to louis again in s4 or later, after s3 it's just gonna feel like another phase in the cycle of abuse- "lestat the vulnerable becomes lestat the irritable becomes lestat the controlling". lestat was seemingly contrite in s2ep7 when he apologized to louis for dropping him, lestat was seemingly torn up in s2ep8 when he expressed heartbreak at louis hurting himself, but all of those moments are rendered meaningless (or at least only reflecting a kind of fleeting self-pity more than any real change or confrontation with his actions) since we've seen in tvl that lestat is perfectly willing to embark on a planned, multi-month darvo tour where he insults louis repeatedly and makes fun of his suicide attempt in his lyrics (bye any ounce of sincerity in the reunion scene) and bitterly nitpicks minutiae like his hair length while refusing to accept what he's done to his family...and then he and louis are on good terms again without any substantial change or growth on lestat's part. and no "he didn't really mean it, he was just lashing out bc he felt hurt and thought louis didn't love him" doesn't rationalize a multi-month darvo tour when "he felt slighted and was acting emotionally" is the crux of so many abusers' behavior. even if lestat was acting impulsively, that's not an excuse, but writing music, organizing a tour and performing those songs where he mocks his own abuse victim for speaking out requires a kind of planning and intent that makes it clear he wasn't being impulsive. it's a calculated move when you're doing it for that long and that consistently. if there had been some real emotional payoff in s3ep7 i could've said the execution was off but i could respect their commitment to exploring the psychology of an abuser in denial, but there's no payoff- it's clear they thought lestat's behavior on tour was just lestat being bitter and zany and cunty and didn't intend or expect the audience to see any weight behind it.
and with these same anti-survivor writers at the helm, even if they did attempt to show lestat apologizing to louis in s4 or beyond, the audience will have no reason to believe or trust that this apology is more sincere or reflects a more permanent change than the apology in s1ep6 or s2ep7 or his tears for claudia in s2ep8 given all of that fell by the wayside as soon as lestat felt "wronged". (and no, he wasn't wronged by louis when it came to the book, as louis isn't responsible for something that was published against his consent and it's not wrong for abuse survivors to talk about their experiences in a biography. the idea that the book is something louis had to apologize for or that the book justifies lestat mocking his own victims publicly, for months- they can't "oh lestat is a creature of impulse" their way outta that one- in itself exposes a kind of anti-survivor thinking, and we have no reason to believe this team of writers, with their unserious attempts at "comic relief" about incestuous abuse, complete disregard for louis and claudia as victims and voyeuristic, gratuitous framing of racialized black suffering think otherwise.)
claudia (back when there were some black writers with input on her writing and back when she could express herself in her own voice- not the way they depicted her in s3 as a mouthpiece for ooc antiblackness filtered exclusively though her white father's pov and written by nonblack writers) was 100% right and remains validated 80 years after her murder. the unintentional message of s3 is that louis and lestat haven't changed and lestat will always be a mercurial abuser who swings between hurting louis and performative self-serving apologies that lead to no real change, and louis will always take him back despite his cruelty. except even in s1-s2 when lestat was fully a narrative antagonist i believed he loved louis, that we were seeing the nuanced portrait of how love and abuse can exist within the same relationships and love doesn't "cancel out" abuse, but now lestat's love feels like an informed attribute that they have to bring a hallucination of paul onscreen to tell us about since it sure as hell isn't demonstrated in lestat's behavior for the vast majority of s3- the way lestat acts in the front half of the season, followed by complete lack of contrition for either what he did in nola/paris or what he did on tour, makes their reunion feel unearned, rushed and insincere. and beyond the antiblackness and anti-survivor rhetoric, the writers have just gotten lazy- loustat is scripted this season as if the writers thought could take for granted that the entire audience is already invested in them, that everyone already wants them back together, and they don't need to put in the work to get viewers onboard with their relationship and get people invested again. and to be fair, this isn't a problem unique to loustat this season- all romantic relationships in tvl get the "tell, not show" treatment and all their important development beats take place offscreen, which makes me think the s1-s2 writers they fired were pulling the weight of most of the romance writing (just like the black writers they fired were clearly pulling the weight of louis and claudia being framed with any compassion whatsoever).
the only thing remotely compelling thing left about loustat's romance is sam and jacob's chemistry, and it's telling that all moments of genuine intimacy and desire between them this season were unscripted and added by the actors (the comforting hug on the sidewalk, louis savoring lestat's blood in the beer etc). the problem isn't that loustat is a bad or "toxic" romance, the problem is that loustat is a badly-written and unearned romance. and as of the end of tvl the actors are its only saving grace.
trying really really hard not to get into fandom discourse. but i must say. the complaints with the lack of queer intimacy in this season arenāt coming from a place of āi want to watch boys kiss uwuā. and to pretend anyone is saying that is disingenuous and you know it.
the PROBLEM is that this show used to never shy away from queer intimacy. the FIRST EPISODE had one of the best sex scenes iāve ever watched in a tv show. louis and lestat kissed all the time, they hugged and cuddled, etc. then season two, louis and armand of course, but also lestat and armand! and louis and dreamstat! narratively there was no real reason to show them making out and drinking from each other (more on that later). but they do! because this is the gay vampire show with gay vampires!
and now, what do we get from s3?
1. transphobic joke at the expense of a nonbinary vampire, they get misgendered, then they die.
2. CANON transmasc/gnc character in the books gabi is turned into a hyper femme dommy mommy character. so not only did they erase her identity from the books, but they decided to swing SO HARD in the other direction. it feels like they only made gabi SO feminine bc they really wanted to go with the incest plotline and god forbid they show lestat making out with anyone whoās not overtly feminine.
3. SO MANY sex scenes. with women. they age up baby jenks, seemingly just so she can fuck lestat. weird. then lestat kisses his mom in like every other episode, and they get PLENTY of sex scenes. NOT ONLY THAT, but she drinks from him in ep2 as well. so we get literal and metaphorical vampire sex. AND GABI ALSO FUCKS JARDA? we SEE. ON SCREEN. GABI FUCKING JARDA. it could have gotten the point across to just hear them moaning and screaming from the other room. it just feels egregious to include that but not any queer intimacy on screen at all.
4. all of the hype around dm for this season. ebogo saying he needed an intimacy coordinator, assad and eric alluding to sucking and fucking since s2 ended!! (for the record iām not blaming either of them for the lack of onscreen queer intimacy we got this season. iām just saying their comments led to an expectation that was not fulfilled)
5. a fetishized, gross, egregious lesbian makeout from regina and fake madeline, for louisā benefit. i have a couple questions about this because like thereās no way louis ASKED them to do that right? heād get nothing from watching his daughtersister make out with her girlfriend. and yes i UNDERSTAND THIS WAS SUPPOSED TO BE UNCOMFORTABLE. but that means weāre allowed to have a deliberately uncomfortable lesbian kiss on screen but nothing else? doesnāt seem much better.
and what DONT we get from s3??
ANY QUEER INTIMACY THAT MATTERS.
sure, maybe lestat and louis arenāt at the point in modern day where they want to be physically intimate. we get the pinky touch and basically nothing else. fine. i personally think thatās a stupid justification for blatant queerphobia but fine.
lestat and nicki DONT EVEN KISS in the flashbacks of them in paris. i thought they were in love?? not enough for even a single kiss between them? louis was making out with dream!stat in s2 and lestat canāt kiss nicki even once?? if ANYONE deserved a kiss this season it was nicki and lestat. that even could have been a great narrative device! to show the difference between lestatās intimacy with nicki juxtaposed with his scenes with gabi. but no. fine.
and in modern day as well, lestat is only allowed to be shown having casual sex with random women, or his mother. it just seems like a glaring omission from mister lestat ānon-discriminatingā di lioncourt. louis got to have on-screen casual sex with jonah in s1! this show has NEVER been scared of queer intimacy before, ācasualā or not.
these omissions are GLARING. this problem is NOT just people missing hot men kissing on screen, and if you think thatās what literally anyone is arguing, you are being intentionally dense. this is a real problem with the season.
TVL's Issues w/ Bias and how it's somehow worse than Anne Rice's(??)
Lestat's season has, shockingly, been all about Lestat. But that doesn't mean the show needs to suffer because of it. Side characters still deserve quality writing, previous seasons still need to be addressed; All in all, this season being from Lestat's perspective does not mean Lestat must exist in a vacuum where everything gets drawn towards him and almost nothing exists outside of that. But it kind of feels that way! And, somehow, I believe the book series written by the number one Lestat glazer herself suffers less from this issue than the show does. WAYYY more under the cut!
In regards to Lestat's actions:
I've always praised the show in the past for being able to sift through Anneās biases and show us something a little more objective/balanced on the screen. Writing literature is a much more intimate process that creating television, and sometimes this shows itself more blatantly with certain authors, such as Anne. TVC follows her through her life and her shifting perspectives using her characters as a vehicle to do so. And while thatās beautiful in its own right, it can hinder the more technical or āobjectiveā side of story telling, which we see through Lestat. Lestat was her favorite, Lestat was her ideal self, and thatās shown true by how every character immediately falls in love with him and- often times- absolves him from his mistakes.
S1&2ās choice to worsen the severity of Lestatās actions, to me, felt like a way to separate itself from Anneās inherently biased story telling. They made it feel as if his decisions had true weight, that no matter what they could not be forgotten and/or absolved (As Claudia says: āWe leave the damage, so we never forget the damageā). But then S3 comes around and it seems like that was all just for show because virtually nothing Lestat did in the previous seasons have been accounted for within 6/7 episodes. Louis takes him back without discussing whether or not Lestat voluntarily participated in his and their daughterās lynching, Lestat takes a passive role in Claudiaās seance despite having turned her and abused her, Akashaās Blood is implied to be intrinsically tied to Lestat dragging Louis by the throat and dropping him from 1000ft (when Louis points out āitās not the blood, itās what you do with itā itās turned into a joke and they start cracking up), all the while Louis apologizes for every little thing and Lestatās entire character arc this season revolves around being victimized.
This complete lack of acknowledgement or admission towards Lestatās wrong doings is so prominent that even Anne herself paid more attention to them in the books! (In reference to Claudiaās turning: āAnd it was out of this desperation to keep him [Louis]ā¦ that I committed the most selfish and impulsive act of my entire life among the undead.ā) Even later on in the series- namely TotBT- when Lestatās actions are particularly vile, he makes no effort to explain them away. Take, for example, his rape of David Talbot, which he acknowledges for what it is: a monstrous violation. This is such a stark contrast from the constant victimization and dumbing down that Lestat suffers from this season that itās honestly astonishing that Anne Rice herself seemed to acknowledge Lestatās behavior for what it was more than the show runners. Which, honestly, thereās just no excuse for. Not only do you consciously choose to make Lestat worse than he is in the source material but you lack the deeply personal relationship Anne had with him! There is no reason to be shoved this far up his ass this season (It being Lestatās POV is no excuse because, with only one episode left, his POV should have been broken down by now)!!
In regards to other characters:
As per mentioned, it's no secret that Lestat was Anne's favorite character. Not only did this show through his characterization, but also the treatment of characters around him. Louis was famously sidelined after iwtv (which is far more complex than just Anne's favoritism of Lestat, but it still feels important to note) and the PL trilogy seems to have the whole vampire world revolving around Lestat. It feels like every vampire has an intense love for him, no matter what. I'd be damned to find more than 2 character's in TVC that is a detractor of his.
Well, TVL doesn't mimic this aspect of bias towards Lestat, but it does implement something that is arguably worse: making the characters nothing but narrative devices to him. I think the treatment of Nicolas this season is one of the examples for this. His character is nonexistent outside of the realm of Lestat. He's the "bipolar boyfriend", the "first love", he's there to serve as a sad flashback and a blockage for Lestat to get past so the plot can advance, NOT to serve as his own character. This is extraordinarily different from the life he is given with the books. His character is not only viewed from a deeply empathetic lens (Lestat describes this very vivid scene when taking Nicki's blood: "I saw a bird soaring out of a cave above the open sea. And there was something terrifying about the bird and the endless waves over which it flew... it was falling gradually and inexorably over nothing save this one tiny creature cawing in the wind above a great wasteland that was the world.), but is nearly always brought up by Lestat in every book he narrates in the series. Within the narrative Nicki isn't just a pawn to be moved forward but a person that existed and is remembered NOT out of some haunting guilt that needs to be reckoned with, but simply because he was there and he was loved.
I also feel like Gabrielle is worth noting when comparing Anne's own biases versus the show runners. Anne had this to say about Gabi's character:
Yet Gabrielle is still given dignity and respect in the books. We watch as she breaks free from her rather violent oppression under the patriarchy and finds who she's always wanted to be within vampirism. As soon as she's liberated she starts presenting as a man, she wanders the woods and goes out on her own to explore. It doesn't erase the lasting trauma she inflicted on Lestat due to her neglect and abandonment, but it does make her a 3 dimensional character that you can feel for. So tell me why the show runners threw all this away to make her a sexual abuser and manipulator who controls Lestat throughout the entire season? Even Anne, who didn't like her, gave her more care than that!
In conclusion:
Season 3 suffers from a quite apparent bias towards it's front man and it seems like it's done too much damage to be fully recovered from in episode 7. I truly believe the writers are hiding under the crux of "It's Lestat's perspective!" in order to write what they want, what fills their agenda, without thinking of the integrity of their work and the standards they set the two previous seasons. The character writing leading up to TVL has been astonishingly brilliant. They're all complex, they're all troublesome, and they're all monsters. But season 3 tells us some are more monstrous than others, some deserve to be humbled more than others, and some are worth less than others. This mindset is extremely different from the complex world Anne Rice had crafted within TVC, in which vampirism is treated as a unifying monstrosity that makes it impossible to hold one character above any of the others.
I'm still holding out hope for episode 7 to re-contextualize at least some of these issues, but I would be hard pressed if it suddenly excused the 6 episodes before it that seem to shamelessly foster them without much proof that they are features rather than bugs.
