I'm watching Supernatural with my wife @ohforgottensky for the first time ever and I would never in my life imagine feeling feelings for these idiots. Send help.
(long post) this is predominately a LouClaudia post addressing her assault, the diary pages and Louis' revenge on the Fang Gang. This does contain a lot of critique of Louis (he is my favourite character) and i want to make clear that my discussions of he and Lestat's parenting and response to Claudia's assault is not a black and white "good parent/bad parent" analysis but something that is part of this post in general.
this post has actually changed from when i initially started writing it after i watched After Dark, saw some reaction clips and some responses of other fans. there was obviously an instinctive need for Bruce to face a horrible death and to have what's coming for him. it's a natural response, we are empathetic human beings and who believe in justice. but i love that this killing was not a moment for some kind of audience gratification and certainly did not result in being gratifying for Louis, that it didn't feel like some kind of Promising Young Woman (2020) vigilantism that forgets about the voice of the victims. the show makes it clear that Claudia had no choice in the matter.
in 1x06, as Louis is recovering, he asks Claudia to maybe even "give him a name" of the person who he has now understood has assaulted her. her response is a sarcastic one, but it highlights that she very much wants to keep distance from her kidnapping and abuse from Bruce. she says: "are you going to be my knight in vengeful black?" which for one, is a resounding NO to Louis' idea of getting revenge, and also that this experience is something for the time being that she wants to process for herself. it's about her. Louis going out supposedly in her name would not benefit her at this point, it would only help his image as the "dark angel," once again reinforcing that Claudia is a tool Louis uses for his own "redemption."
this tracks up until 2x03, when Louis is "prying to keep [them] safe" and Claudia responds with "[i don't remember what else you want me to say] i remember what i remember." this once again is Claudia trying to personalise her own experience. it is bad enough that she has had to share minor details about Bruce in some capacity as a cover for the murder of Lestat, but she now she feels once again that Louis has over-stepped. it makes the moment when she finally does reveal some details later in the coffin more touching and more harrowing, as we see that to some extent Claudia is rebuilding her trust with Louis. not only does this make Louis and Armand's reading of her diaries after her death all the more wrong, it worsens when you think about the control Louis then has over these pages, essentially adopting and owning Claudia's story, despite her rebuttal in 1x06 representing it as an event that belongs to her.
in 1x05, the Dubai scenes with Daniel are some of my favourite from the Dubai moments. Not only because of how meta some of his dialogue is (about how fans of the book may misconstrue the meanings like fans of the show do) because though it is a supposedly "protective" action of Claudia, it is complete hypocrisy for Louis to claim "to not have her exploited" but then even give Daniel ANY of her diaries in the first place. Louis already knows that Claudia hated her diary being read without her permission from the flashbacks in 1x05, but her wishes are completely ignored once again.
some might argue that Lestat also read her diaries in 1x05, but the context is very much different. Claudia was going through a mental crisis, her behaviour was dangerous and was risking putting both Lestat and Louis in danger as well. the reading of her diary at that point was because she was still technically a child of the household, who Lestat and Louis has a responsibility over. it was those complicated issues of a child's privacy vs. a child's safety. however for the rest of the show, Claudia is a full blown adult. Louis is no longer responsible for her in the same way, yet after she dies, Louis takes it upon herself to read her journals in what audiences can interpret as a way to still feel close to her in his grief, and in essence "editorialise" her story to Daniel. there are so many levels of wrong to this, it is so horribly violating, which is why i feel like the scene with Bruce is representative of that.
Louis reads Claudia's recording of her assault to Bruce, in fact, he has it memorised. Louis still getting choked up as he reads was firstly incredibly acting from Jacob Anderson, but i also think the first indicator that this death of Bruce will not solve anything. it will not take this grief away. it will not bring Claudia back. i see lots of different takes who often talk about the Train Scene (which is has been hinted at not even happening) and somewhat blame Lestat for not going out to hunt down Bruce despite knowing what he did to Claudia, and i think this disregards Claudia's feelings. that is NOT want she wants. she spent six years with Louis who was more than ready to do so, but she chose to not even tell him. people fail to realise that Lestat understands Claudia perhaps more than the other characters.
repeatedly, he tells Louis of the emotional disturbance he can see in Claudia after her rape. "she came back altered"/" there is a darkness in her that wasn't there before" (1x06) except...Louis does not necessarily care for this very evident ruthlessness of Claudia. though in the same episode he does call her out for being "ugly" when she behaves cruelly towards Lestat, he does little offer Claudia a different solution. in essence, we see this new "artful predator" of Claudia run rings around Louis. she shuts him down in the debate about "making compromises" and continues to encourage secret communication between the two despite it being against the family rules. Louis does not want to accept that the girl who has returned is no longer the excitable teenager he was previously raising, that she has become hardened and different, so as per usual he buries his head in the sand and allows her to continue with her plotting.
i bring up this point to show that getting revenge on Bruce, both back then and now was "never about [Claudia]." the help Louis should have instead offered, was the emotional support Claudia clearly needed, which he ignored like he always does when Claudia begins acting out (like in 1x05) because he only likes to see Claudia as his doll and as his "throw pillow," her purpose being the multiple ways she can emotionally serve him (e.g. feeling less guilty over her life if he kills Bruce)
of course, this is not to say that Louis does not love Claudia, here is a post i made recently unpicking their season 2 dynamic that i love. but i think i just love the show perfectly illustrating how hollow of a "victory" this is for Louis, not only because it doesn't solve his grief or erase his mistakes, but for the fact that had Claudia still been alive, she probably would have never wanted this.
but that the season wasn't subtle at all with how it was centered around lestat having been sexually abused by his mother for over two centuries—abuse which started before they were ever even vampires—and that the finale culminates in lestat finally starting to come to terms with that knowledge to the point of standing up to gabriella and rejecting her from his life yet people keep going on about how "nothing happened this season" and "lestat didn't suffer at all" or at least "not enough" (in a season where lestat was sexually and/or physically assaulted every episode) and "there were too many 'sex' scenes between gabriella and lestat" (re: scenes of gabriella sexually assaulting lestat) and "there was too much focus on them" (in a season about how much gabriella sexually abusing lestat has affected him.)
Actually I made another rykard sticker but I failed to upload the original image in the past few days... Then I tried to make a screenshot and uploaded it then it went well. idk if it is because of the image parsing algorithm having some bugs.
P.S. The composition is inspired by the shadow puppetry of the late Qing Dynasty, which featured some deeply impactful artistic techniques for depicting scenes of characters being killed:
Went to an Oedipus Rex adaption today and my friends were debating whether the Oedipus/Jocasta age gap was problematic. Like guys…I think their relationship has bigger issues
the worst thing about all those dracula adaptations that recast mina as a pure wilting heroine caught in a dark romance with the sexy evil vampire who's obsessed with her, is that that story already exists. my girl my queen the sexy evil obsessive vampire of all of our dreams carmilla karnstein is RIGHT THERE!! laura, the pure sweet heroine who cannot resist the dark sexyevil allure of the vampire who won't leave her alone is RIGHT THERE. the people do not want dracula. the people yearn for carmilla.
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