dopamine

like flowers from a tomb. ♡ vix, thirty-three, lesbian. #usercherry

[rihfenty]

if i told you how much I think about her you'd think i was in love

[boyd-stevens]

"I’m acting so weird. This is so weird."

OBSESSION 2026, dir. Curry Barker

[vhagar-balerion-meraxes]

HOUSE OF THE DRAGON S03E05 - “Unbowed And Unbent”

[totalsellout]

ANOK YAI wearing Ashi Studio SS26 Couture (2026 TIME 100 Gala)

[coldeveryseason]

so many creative choices in tvl make sense when you realize the goal of this season wasn't telling lestat's story or adapting tvl the book but using the premise of "adapting tvl" as the justification for a whitecentric rebrand and lowkey reboot of the whole show, as part of amc and rolin's effort to distance themselves from the "black queer show" image and black viewership of s1-s2 in order to pursue the "mainstream" (whiter, straighter) audience they always wanted. this is why most of the major arcs, especially the material given to jacob, delainey and assad, feel like retreads of the arcs they already had in s2, meant to cover plot beats from s1-s2 and overwrite how they were initially depicted in a way that's both more palatable for white viewers. in many ways tvl feels like 7 episodes of a "previously on..." sequence that flits through brief flashbacks and tells, not shows the audience essential information to get them caught up before the real story begins, and that's intentional- tvl isn't meant to be a story that stands on its own as much as a staging point to establish the new trajectory of the show, the new tone and narrative priorities, and invite the audience amc wants onboard and jettison the melanated s1-s2 audience amc thinks it no longer needs before the real story rolin wants to tell begins in s4.

the narrative seems not only spiteful and uncompassionate to its own established characters and audience but almost apologetic for having demanded that viewers hold empathy for black leads during s1-s2, for asking them to center black characters as protagonists and care about their interiority- the brutalization and humiliation of jacob and delainey's characters isn't just the nonblack writers engaging in a gratuitous fantasy of torturing black bodies and "humbling" black characters who've reached too far above their station, but also a way to restore the status quo that asserts the "proper" role of blackness is to be a site of inherent pain and mortification. racist viewers who rejected the show when jacob was cast in 2021 or at any point during s1-s2 bc the idea of getting invested in messy black leads put them off can now comfortably tune back in, assured that the show will never ask them to care about a black person more than a white person or think a black person's material suffering could matter more than a nonblack person's feelings and reputation ever again. the cruelty is the point, in many ways.

it's valid to criticize tvl for claiming to be an adaptation of the tvl book and failing at that on every level, from tone to sincerity to the fact that like. 80% of the book just wasn't adapted, but once you see through the marketing claims and realize the real purpose of this season was just amc's effort to do a soft reboot and relaunch their vampire show as a cynical whitecentric dramedy without drawing the ire of straight-up canceling iwtv, you realize so many of their choices aren't just writerly incompetence but a deliberate creative and network whitelash on multiple levels of production.

[coldeveryseason]

i might make a longer post about this later looking at the entirety of iwtvl through woodard's historical analysis but for now here are some excerpts from "delectable negro" that are relevant wrt the nonblack tvl writers, particularly rolin and hannah at the helm as white showrunner/head writer, directly referencing and pulling on this imagery in louis' onscreen brutalization. the torture of louis' rotting body in a literal butcher shop and louis coerced to apologize for his sins in s3ep7, the derogatory lines about louis and lemuel's femininity in s3ep2 and s3ep6, and louis' amputated leg in the flash-forward in s3ep1 are esp relevant. rolin has already given a post-s3ep7 interview where he's teeheeing with the also-white interviewer about the fact that louis is now physically disabled (they had a quippy "someone's missing an eye" "someone's missing a foot" exchange about the flash-forward) and that he has been branded on his chest.

and rolin and hannah don't have the range to pull on this history and this kind of violence for shock value- and it was intended primarily for shock value instead of any kind of racial commentary bc rolin said they went for the choice to have louis tortured like that in s3ep7 bc horror fans considered this show "horror-lite". the brutalization and branding of a decapitated black body and torture of two black characters was used as a way for the white showrunner to try to show off his hardcore horror chops to people who didn't think s1-s2 (which rolin calls "cuddly"- the seasons with the literal race riot, domestic violence and lynching) was extreme enough.

[rihfenty]

RIHANNA Fenty Skin (2026)

[rosesgray]

BEYONCÉ performing Drunk in Love at JAYZ30 (New York City)

[blondessource]

LILI REINHART. Cosmopolitan Magazine.

[reticent-vampire]

cunt4cunt 🫶

[dojacatsource]

I look like her if you round to ten

OKAYYY Latto & Doja Cat

[narcobarbies]

LATTO ft. DOJA CAT Okayyy (2026)

[jellco]

HAPPY 28TH BIRTHDAY MAGGIE LINDEMANN ! ⋆˙⟡ Margaret Elizabeth Lindemann was born July 21st, 1998, in Dallas, TX, into a German-Scottish family. She began posting recordings of her singing on the social media apps Tumblr and Keek until she was discovered by her manager from a video of her singing on Instagram ⋆˙⟡

[narcobarbies]

DOJA CAT via Twitch

[rihfenty]

OKAYYY Latto & Doja Cat

[jellco]

RIHANNA at the hotel after the World Cup Final in New York City (July 2026)

[simoneashley]

Louis de Pointe du Lac in Interview With The Vampire Season 3 (2026)