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@armandsbitchboy and I were discussing the lack of sex between the main "ships" this season, and how we both actually prefer non sexual intimacy - for me this was a huge draw of the books when I was first reading them as a teenager, as well as the way the characters can have sex without actually having it, via biting and blood drinking.

This made me start thinking about the way sex is shown in TVL as opposed to series 1 and 2.

For those first two seasons sex is generally shown on screen as a pleasant experience for all concerned. Unpleasant sexual encounters such as Claudia's repeated assaults by Bruce take place offscreen.

In TVL this dynamic is reversed. Every sexual encounter we are shown is rape (Magnus), abusive (Gabriella) or indifferent (the constant groupie sex that Lestat has). The only true intimate encounter we see, between Nicky and Lestat, has a cut away before anything really happens.

I would surmise that this is deliberate and speaks to the attitude of the respective narrators towards sexual intimacy. For Louis sex is associated with love, hence why he's hurt when Lestat wants other sexual partners. Even when he does have his own encounter with someone else immediately following this conversation, it's with someone he loved.

For Lestat sex is either traumatic, or it is utilised like a drug to numb his feelings of emptiness and loneliness, as he tells us in the song of the same name. BTW, it is not uncommon at all for people with a traumatic sexual history to become hypersexual as a coping mechanism, so these two things are not incongruent.

This leads me to the idea that perhaps for Lestat non-sexual intimacy with partners he actually loves may be more important to him. One of the reasons episode 6 was by far and away my favourite episode this season was because of how closely Lestat and Louis' relationship mirrored the dynamic of the books, and how intimate they were onscreen without even a kiss.

Another point I'd like to make regarding this: I've seen many in the fandom bemoaning the lack of sex scenes between intimate partners this season (Devils Minion, Lestat and Louis, Lestat and Nicky etc).

I would say that due to the way all the other sexual encounters are shown (violent, abusive or meaningless) it would be extremely difficult to frame an intimate sexual encounter as tender and emotional. Can you imagine showing Lestat and Nicky together in the same episode Lestat is raped by Magnus? Or Lestat and Louis getting back together in this way in the same episode that Gabriella's incestuous abuse is exposed? It would leave a really foul taste to the whole thing, and during episode 6 in particular I was really hoping nothing physical happened between Lestat and Louis for precisely that reason.

sometimes I’m reminded that there are still people who don’t know ao3 was literally created by incest shippers — and the site’s sole purpose is to 1. be completely against censorship and 2. host all kinds of dark, taboo fics that are banned on other platforms — and the first ever fic that was posted on ao3 was a fic about an incest ship from supernatural.

you are in the house that was created by freaks. for freaks (affectionate). every disgusting thing you can think of is rightfully allowed and welcomed on ao3, because they are exactly the reasons why ao3 was created in the first place.

ao3 was created because its creators got tired of censorship, they got tired of dark and taboo fics getting banned on pro-censorship platforms, and they wanted a place that was safe for ALL FICS THAT WERE DARK AND TABOO.

ao3’s main principle is being against censorship and being proship / profic.

there are some things in fiction that make me uncomfortable, but instead of shaming people who are just minding their own business and not harming anyone in real life, I choose to curate my own internet experience by blocking/muting what I don’t want to see. ao3 has excellent tagging system, so instead of being a bitch, use their tagging system properly and you won’t see the things you don’t want to see.

it’s your job to curate what you see. it’s not other people’s jobs or responsibilities to censor themselves for your personal comfort. the world does not revolve around you.

also you cannot censor “only the things you personally hate” without expecting everything else, that isn’t of conservative beliefs, to be censored too. because censorship is a slippery slope and a fascist tool. I promise you there are people who think “why do tags for queer love even exist on ao3? they’re grooming children”.

if you allow the things that you hate to be censored — because someone with enough power gets to control what other people can and cannot create/consume, it will not stop at the things that you hate.

"Bear is the villain, okay. There's some, like, grabby headlines out there where it's like "Michael Johnston doesn't agree that Bear's the villain." And I'm, like, NO WAY! Hold on a second, Bear is the vil-lain. He made his choice. Maybe he didn't know [the wish] would work but the choices he made after that, he clearly shows that he was incapable of thinking about anyone other than himself." — Michael Johnston (Bear) talking about Bear's character on The Brandon Davis Show! OBSESSION (2026) Dir. Curry Barker