one of the ways i see it starting..
they first encounter each other sometime in the 1930s. hellstrom knows he’s gay but is in DEEP denial.. which works for him until he meets landa. he becomes oddly fixated on landa and justifies it by telling himself that he must prove to be superior over landa (which is partially true because it starts from attraction/envy). landa recognises those patterns in hellstroms behaviour and engages with them selectively. they don’t really get together until 1938.
before 1938 hellstrom becomes more inconsistent in his “hate” towards landa, landa leans into it the ambiguity intentionally. around 1938 their relationship exists (in secret obviously), hellstrom resists naming it and landa refuses to define it for him.
even then hellstrom performs rejection of their relationship, yet he keeps on maintaining it. landa is very neutral and entertained by it, he mocks hellstrom about it playfully. hellstrom hates the fact that landa is accepting of himself and their relationship even more.
for hellstrom the ideology is ontological, for landa it’s operational.
landa has a slightly stockier, softly built physique with a relaxed silhouette. he also has subtle muscle definition in his arms as a result of daily activity. his uniform sharpens his appearance to a degree, but never quite to the extent it’s expected of for someone in his position and rank. -> along with his polite and friendly act it comes across as disarming in his interrogations, which he makes deliberate use of.
hellstrom in comparison is lean, his built is more structured with a rigid posture. his physique seems carefully maintained rather than naturally relaxed. -> discipline (well, the appearance of it.) is very important to him and that extends to his body and habits.
more general headcanons on their dynamic and such
landa loves to use pet-names half genuinely and half mockingly. hellstrom only uses them condescendingly.
their love language mostly consists of mocking each other but with precision and knowledge only they know about each other.
they don’t share a bed often but when they do neither of them is the big or small spoon, they’ll go to sleep with 1m distance between them and somehow wake up in the weirdest positions ever. which is odd because hellstrom usually isn’t a deep sleeper.
despite being a deep sleeper landa somehow manages to invade hellstroms personal space in his sleep and wakes up with several bruises as a result.
hellstrom insists he doesn’t remember hitting landa.
they both have a preference for sweets, though landa’s is more indulgent and unstructured, while hellstroms is more selective and restrained.
landa keeps “banned” books (kafka, heine, mann.. etc.) for hellstrom tucked away in a secret place in his living quarters because hellstrom likes to read them but he would never keep them at his own place. landa also reads them.
hellstrom is somehow better at chess than landa. while landa is better at card games like bridge. they both like board games. like “Mensch, ärger dich nicht.” (German board game named “Man, don’t get angry.”)
landa occasionally slips into his viennese dialect when he’s very relaxed or tipsy in private with hellstrom and it makes hellstrom respond with a mildly mocking, dry “Gesundheit.” (“bless you.”) as if landa was just making incomprehensible noise.
over time hellstrom starts getting a fairly good grasp on the viennese dialect because landa starts incorporating words and phrases into his daily usage around hellstrom, so at one point hellstrom just gives clean dry replies to whatever landa is saying in his dialect.
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