delphic

[rabdoidal]

I’ve been thinking about episode 7 of City Council of Darkness and about Lavonte reacting the way he did to Maya assuming he and HJ were a couple.

Lavonte and HJ represent exact tropes of homosexuality and vampirism of the 1980s; by the 80s, vampires had shifted from countryside landed gentry hiding away in musty castles to urbanised capitalists - the setting changes, but they still benefit from the toil of others as the bourgeoisie against the proletariat (Morrissette, 2013). At the same time, people moving to cities during the industrial revolution to work formed proletariat communities of their own, including homosexuals that left their homes in search of a better life; the city was different than their small-knit towns where everyone knew everyone, and gave them freedom. By the 80s HIV/AIDs crisis, horror had synthesised vampires and homosexuality to be intertwined urban concepts; for members of these groups (homosexuals/vampires), there is an element of hunting or pursuing a partner (cruising/finding a victim), exchanging fluids (cum/blood), and those fluids put you at risk of sickness or death (AIDs/vampirism) (Clark, 2022). There is, further, the idea of “turning someone” - this is framed as a bad thing by out-members, but contains nuance within the community. They are both seductive. They are both abnormal. You should warn your children about (homosexuals/vampires), do not let your daughter move to the city, or she will become a (homosexual/vampire). Within horror, vampires began to be queer coded; Daughters of Darkness (1971), The Hunger (1983), Fright Night (1985), The Lost Boys (1987).

HJ is the exemplar of the 80s vampire - he is a businessman with immense power, he is slick, he is clean shaven and well dressed, he is a confirmed bachelor. He is coded as (homosexual/vampire), and it’s interesting to think about whether Lavonte pursued HJ because he was a vampire, or because HJ was a man. It is risky for either of those factors to be what makes him appealing, but the desire alongside the disorder is what makes it a (homosexual/vampire) love story - it would be horrifying to want someone while also being terrified of what they can do to you. It completely makes sense to me that Lavonte, even though Lou played it as a joke, would have reservations about people thinking he was gay. Being gay in the 80s meant being dirty, meant being sick, meant being less masculine or respected, meant being the “other,” regardless of if he’s gay or not (Clark, 2022). Even though I see Lavonte as being totally accepting, being gay himself would be an admission of guilt in some way. Lavonte is focused, charismatic, and doesn’t like hearing “no” - if someone implied he seduced HJ to gain vampirism, I think that would be his nightmare.

Truly, even though none of their 80s-gay-vampirism coding was intentional, and even though Lou and Ally were playing up the miscommunication as a joke, I think it's interesting to see how character moments make logical sense within meta-horror. It’s been a great season so far.

Clark, Ian (2022) "Infectious Queers: HIV/AIDS and the Vampiric Body in Interview with the Vampire (1994)," Journal of Dracula Studies: Vol. 24: No. 1, Article 4. DOI: 10.70013/n1p5h7g4 Available at: https://research.library.kutztown.edu/dracula-studies/vol24/iss1/4

Fullilove MT, Wiley J, Fullilove RE 3rd, Golden E, Catania J, Peterson J, Garrett K, Siegel D, Marin B, Kegeles S, et al. Risk for AIDS in multiethnic neighborhoods in San Francisco, California. The population-based AMEN Study. West J Med. 1992 Jul;157(1):32-40. PMID: 1413740; PMCID: PMC1021901. 

Heller J. Rumors and Realities: Making Sense of HIV/AIDS Conspiracy Narratives and Contemporary Legends. Am J Public Health. 2015 Jan;105(1):e43-e50. doi: 10.2105/AJPH.2014.302284. PMID: 25393166; PMCID: PMC4265931.

Morrissette, J. J. (2013). Marxferatu: The Vampire Metaphor as a Tool for Teaching Marx’s Critique of Capitalism. PS: Political Science & Politics, 46(3), 637–642. doi:10.1017/S1049096513000607 

[rrat-king]

this intro then immediately followed up by this:

lavonte as much as you are loathe to admit it I know ur deal

[t4tozier]

“your eminency, with all due respect…suck my dick, fuck you, and if you have any problems you can come downtown, or i can ask your daughter if you make her feel unsafe” sklonda gukgak the woman you are.

[asymptotic-rage]

Imagine being Tyler.

Your bosses are super toxic. They pay for your grandpa to leave his terrible housing. They tell you to work 17 hours a day. They immediately give you a promotion. You've never seen them in the daytime and they think lunch happens at 8pm.

[mndvx]

we had Ncuti Gatwa as Dr Who and the show fumbled him harder than anyone has ever fumbled anything in the history of the world never forget that and never ever forgive russell t davies for that

[bobcatblahs]

If I had a nickel for everytime RTD had a dead sexy man from the northern part of the UK in a leather coat with a close cropped haircut playing the Doctor and then treated them like shit and fumbled the bag…”

“I’d have two nickels… which isn’t a lot, but it’s weird that it happened twice…”

[okmurph]

Now that’s IMPROV BABY

[i-like-dropout]

fantasies about vampires coming to your town to fall in love with you and make hot vampire sex to you: old, outdated, boring

fantasies about vampires coming to your town to improve the public infrastructure, destroy the rich families milking you for money, and perhaps also making hot vampire sex to you (or helping you make hotter sex with your partner of many years): rejuvenating, what we need in this day and age, modern

[biria8]

So the Whittakers are Democrats and the Douglasses are Republicans and it seems "they probably fight about superficial stuff to make you think that there's an illusion of choice, but really they're exactly the same people." Yeah, that tracks

[quiddie]

*deep breath* If the antifascist (esp. American-centered) art you make or consume refuses to acknowledge the truth that framing this time period as the "sudden rise of fascism" along with its supposed volatility (i.e. "it can't last; that's not how its built") is just a comforting construct to keep white Americans from reckoning with their literal centuries of active and passive participation in this country's fascist, genocidal violence against Indigenous and Black people, your art isn't just wrong...it's worthless. How can you imagine dismantling unjust systems without seeing the blood on your own hands? How do you comprehend the size of the fight for mutual liberation without seeing that the scale of the threat is exponentially larger than your personal experience of the danger of state violence; or is your envisioned win condition only as shallow as the return to your previous sense of safety?

Ignoring the complexities and well-established enmeshment of fascism in Western culture for the sake of simpler stories to inspire rising to this moment in history only builds fair-weather fighters ill-prepared for the rigors of revolutionary action. It also widens the rift between those newly awakened to the struggle and their neighbors that have lived it for generations (and have built and maintained systems of community support and resistance that have protected them for just as long).

If antifascist art doesn't first demand you turn the eye inward, it is only escapist fluff.

[sparrow-the-tired-lesbian]

The effort put into Rocky’s voice astounds me. When Grace lets it slip that he’s not going to go home, Rocky is so upset he forgets to clarify “why didn’t you tell me” is a question, which is abundantly familiar for people speaking a second language when emotions run high.

When the translator is working, you can still hear the musical tones of his natural voice in the background (a detail a lot of franchises have missed, I’ve noticed.) In the scene where Grace is pinned to the control panel and the translator doesn’t work anymore, you can clearly hear Rocky saying his name in a higher octave, panicked.

This movie ruined my life I want to own it on DVD immediately

[panspy-draws]

Literally made in a lab for me to get attached to. You KNOW i had to draw them as the batman/carrie kelley cover i have as my phone wallpaper

[hawke-gosling]

And hang out they did

[arorowlet]

Zaeth Bondana is just a Ken. He doesn’t know what his job is. He just wants a horse. He doesn’t know he’s Kenough.

[ghostly-cabbage]

Chat am I on to something

[islandoforder]

it’s just so on brand for brennan to be like yeah i’m putting stephen king in the campaign but she’s a black indigenous woman and instead of maine she’s hyper focused on the pacific northwest

[darrenpillowscriss]

Sometimes a family is a girl who doesn’t go to this school, her dad who’s not her dad but we’re gonna call her dad, and his cousin through marriage.

And that’s beautiful.

[miidniite]

episode 5 begins, Beth looking for answers, Nancy Dunderhoof on their tail, Aaron is preparing - but the masquerade remains intact, for now. And the intrepid heroes look outside their airbnb, they see across the street is

a '67 black chevy impala

carry on my wayward son starts playing