❦ xale mata ❦

the stars aloft and the clouds all strewn dreaming beneath a crescent moon

[spore-loser]

WELCOME / i am vee (she, her) ✴︎ sometimes i make graphics; sometimes i write.

this started as a book blog, but has come to encompass a bit of everything as i wade further out of compartmentalizing.

>> analysis • edits + moodboards • fanfiction • recs + reviews

SUBJECT ✴︎ MATTER / content & shipping caution

as a multishipper who can see the appeal of different character dynamics, i don't ingest media expecting characters to act perfectly, or for idealized pairings or romance — >> i just think writers as creators and readers as an audience need to be honest about the subject matter of stories. ( an example: the ACOTAR series by sarah j. maas [who has a whole list of controversies and plagarism examples: one, two] is not a "feminist healing stories" narrative with ideal pairings. )

d i v i d e r : @thecutestgrotto

[xalatath]

Everybody in the club Yield to my will

[loopnoid]

claudeleine thru the eras

[bimtimtom]

about that new delainey picture

[likehandlingroses]

Careful the tale you tell That is the spell Children will listen

[phoebe-apollonia]

These two af asf as fuck

[loveridden1999]

for those unaware today india experienced one of its biggest protests in half a decade. there were protests all over the nation for various causes but the major one was in delhi. all we asked for was the resignation of the education minister because he's failed the students of this nation time & time again. but we were met with brutality, the police had barricaded the main site of protest (jantar mantar). metro stations were shutdown, the public was restrained from reaching the protest site and all the adjoining areas had signal jammers to make sure the crowd had no access to constant updates. they had us blocked from all the sides. they were lathi (baton) charging students from one side & releasing tear gas from the other. you couldn't walk 100 m on streets without having a tear gas shell thrown at you. there were many students, women & kids bleeding — some from their head. some couldn't walk anymore. the police had removed their nameplates, covered their faces & acted with full impunity to resort to unprecedented levels of violence. they were pelting stones at us, beating up people for no reason, forcefully detaining them and attacking us constantly with tear gas & rubber bullets. they wouldn't let you exit either. the crowd was peaceful & looking out for each other yet they were met with violence. i made a friend who was all alone & she asked to join me & my friend because a policeman wouldn't leave her alone. he constantly prodded her for personal info, invited her back to the jeep saying they have food there, wouldn't stop following her around. you couldn't call or ask anyone for help, we were left to fend for ourselves & be on a constant lookout if you did not want to be beaten up to death by police. all for what? asking a resignation? shame on this country.

[marithlizard]

(via bsky)

In case anyone hasn't heard, the cyclospora outbreak affecting tons of people in the US right now is coming from Taylor Farms produce. Best to stay away from bagged lettuce and prepared salads completely right now, but especially the ones mentioned in the screenshot:

Taylor Farms Earthbound Farms Little Salad Bar (Aldi) Marketside (Walmart) Kroger House Brand Target private label greens Costco salads and greens etc Trader Joe's chopped salad kits and fresh produce Fast food: McDonalds, Taco Bell, (Yum! Brands), Chipotle, Subway, Pizza Hut, KFC, Olive Garden, Top Golf, Red Lobster, Burger King, etc.

This is not the first time I've heard about a Taylor Farms foodborne illness outbreak. I stopped eating their salads after reading a description of the conditions in their facilities. Doesn't sound like they've improved anything.

We need a fully funded and staffed FDA, and regulations with teeth - and that's exactly what we don't have under Trump. To make things worse, the CDC is no longer tracking these outbreaks. We're on our own.

[iamanewvagina101]

what r ur kinks

I'm consumed by grief

[kanakori]

daywalker

[cruxgemata]

“Claudia was an unforeseen joy.

A formidable fledgling.

A consummate killer,

a congenial companion.

We were a happy trio.”

[sillystigmata]

No matter how you felt about this season (and there are a lot of feelings to be had), we still really have the cast of all time. I love them so much.

[crazykuroneko]

A Note from IWTV S2 Writer A. Zell Williams

Read here:

Fan Appreciation Daze

How a show's fans lifted my spirits years after working on the series.

[yaoist]

I'm sure his work as the WGA strike captain had nothing at all to do with being let go.

[arduennas]

daniel "i don't have transformational trauma" molloy & louis "i don't consider myself abused" de pointe du lac & lestat "abuser? liberator. emancipator" de lioncourt & armand "i basked in his mercy" de nolastname. let's all be in denial with mama

[resplendentgoldenwings]

Claudia was a serial killer taking trophies and she applauded humans getting killed and tortured on stage before a live audience. Louis was a whole gay plague in San Francisco. Armand paid people so he could hunt them before killing them. Daniel has thrown himself in full force. And I don't think I need to list the fuck shit Lestat has done.

They literally live as parasites on humanity and none of them have actually chosen the honorable thing which is self-immolation, because they're monsters.

They're going to keep doing monstrous shit to the humans they encounter, their fellow vampires and themselves. Because they're monsters.

None of them are good. None of them are morally superior to the others. This show is not concerned with whose a goody-goody gum drops. It's concerned with who is being the worst today and why? And each is going to get their turn. That's it and you'll get so much more out of it if you stop trying to be on a moral high horse and get down here in the muck with the rest of us.

P.S. Claudia was a villain before Delainey Hayles and Bailey Bass were a glimmer in their mothers' eyes. If you're looking for morally pure black representation find a different show.

[mementomauri]

I do have a fondness for how gothic and erotic lit had a certain barrier to entry. Like I do love more ppl getting into the vampire chronicles and I'll always be happy to have more Loustat fans but those books are weird and melancholic and erotic and philosophical and constantly testing boundaries and asking questions. And it feels like ppl are expecting or wanting "the vampire diaries but gay". The books have uncomfortable moments and the characters will do and say and believe things that make you double take but so much of the books are just "how moral can I be when nothing matters and I'm immortal?"

This isn't just a tale of gay vampires. It's a haunting philosophical treatise about life, mortality, morality, death, depression, incest, rape, love, regret, and the Pain Of Time. It can be fun and it can be gross and it can be wonderful but it's not for the timid.

[theatredeslestat]

I agree!!

I feel like so many people who try to consume gothic media don’t actually know what the “gothic” part of “gothic literature/media” is.

which is ok btw but,

It isn’t just media that is supernatural, it’s dark, broody, and tackles some really difficult subject matter. THAT is what makes it “gothic”.

In short, what makes gothic media “gothic” is in-fact the uncomfortable taboo stuff

Thank you op for bringing this up!

[spore-loser]

The cycle of abuse and generational trauma is the big theme of this season of the show. We see why Lestat is Lestat, get more of an idea of why Armand is the way he is, etc. — why events of the story resulted in what they did.

[fay989]

I’m a little drunk and tired so this isn’t going to be as eloquently written as it deserves to be, howeverrr,

I think it’s evident that in the IWTV/TVL fandom, there’s this simmering debate about moralizing the characters/show vs analyzing the show through a more critical & distant lense. And it reminds me of this time in college when I gave a presentation on a controversial religious sect and I was all “well, they’re good because of blah blah blah, but…. they’re bad because of blah blah”. And my professor interrupted me in the middle of the presentation and goes “this is the problem with Your Generation™️, you want to moralize everything and center yourself, but you will have a more impactful analysis if you stop inputting your own opinion and just analyze what is actually happening.”

So it’s kinda like the joke of there being a ‘Woke 1’ era vs the (current) beginning of ‘Woke 2’, you know? There’s an emerging bend towards understanding that identity politics and moralization flattens your (our) understanding and analysis of fictional events, or of historical events, etc. There’s an emergent recognition & reflection of how identity politics has been used by the far right & the capitalist class to keep people divided and bickering. And stating this DOES NOT therefore mean that identity politics should be trashed altogether, or that there’s no such thing as marginalization or privilege, etc. It just means that viewing things purely through the lens of identity politics is, by definition, reductionist, and that this element of this type of analysis is essentially why it has persisted for so long…because we talk in circles and circles and, in many cases, the result is… what?

In fact, I’m not even bagging on identity politics in particular, it’s just the prevalent method of our time. Like, analyzing anything through the lens of any one viewpoint is reductionist. That’s what reductionist means… to reduce to one thing, one viewpoint, etc. In political theory classes you may be asked to write papers on topics from the perspective of certain theories, like camera lenses, and even though you don’t agree with a particular theory, you need to write the goddamn paper anyway. It is okay, and safe, and can even be fun, to engage with art or concepts that you don’t personally agree with.

And I sorta think that this is why IWTV has become so popular, besides the good writing, etc, etc. I think, when we look back in 10 years, this show is going to be so clearly ‘of it’s time’ [affectionate] in the sense that it forces people to battle with this idea of there being a grey area. All of the characters suck and all of them are great. They’re literal monsters, remember? Like, they murder people? Like just cuz they’re hot doesn’t mean they’re not monsters. You like Lestat despite him abusing Louis by dropping him from 5,000 feet or whatever. You like Louis even though he’s creeping on some waitress. You like Claudia even though she accidentally murdered the men she dated. You like Armand even though— even though, even though, even though.

And I think this season so far has created the start of some fantastic discourse about the cycle of abuse. It reminds me a lot of this Gabor Maté video (around the 20min mark) where he discusses how a traumatic childhood event manifests in his relationship style with his wife. And he says that doesn’t excuse him and absolve him from responsibility, but rather it makes him ask what can he do to liberate himself so that he doesn’t continue this cycle of imposing his issues onto his wife. Do you see how this is a deeper & more effective analysis than “bad man in relationship is bad”?

So anyway, I think that’s the underlying reason of why this show is so popular within the broader context of our societal consciousness (for lack of a less-pretentious way to say it). We’re being introduced to this muscle that we haven’t had to exercise in a decade, or two, or maybe never. We’re being forced to recon with the idea of there being grey areas and nuance. At the end of the day, characters are tools in the story, in the same way the lighting or the setting or the background score are tools. You know what I mean? It’s uncomfortable and that’s what makes it interesting, it makes you chew on it. A little friction isn’t bad. And in fact, not to be dramatic, but slowly adjusting to the idea of experiencing friction is probably necessary as we descend into fascism, etc etc. And pondering about a TV show is a very safe and easy way to do that.