Murf's Personals

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”?

This is why I stay on Lestat's neck, because I'm WAITING for him to realize that HE is the common denominator; HE is the one who can stop this toxic abusive cycle for good. HE is the one turning fledgling after fledgling, trying to "fix" what's wrong with his life, meanwhile making the exact same mistakes over & over--because he hasn't processed any of his trauma yet; and he's only gonna get worse before he finally gets better.

As Sam Reid said: Lestat & Louis need each other, in order for them to BOTH "learn to become BETTER monsters."

Loustat can NEVER have Viktor & Rose, or reach their Disneyfied Prince Lestat Trilogy Chateau Era HEA, until they've processed what led to them losing Claudia. 😔 Yeah, the book being published sucks, and some of it is a bunch of dirty lies Daniel/the Talamasca/Armand put in Louis' mouth. But some of it speaks to some very valid & very dark truths about the sad state of the Unholy Family by the time Murder Night happened. Context being revisited/revealed so we understand Lestat's trauma in a more nuanced light doesn't change the overall trajectory of Claudia's determination to KILL him & go to Europe & wind up in the Theatre's hands--a coven Lestat never even warned his fledglings about in the first place.

Claudia clocked Lestat tea, "He don't give good answers to questions; sits on the truth like it's his chair or somethin'." So on top of him projecting all his traumas & paranoia & abandonment issues onto his Blood Children; every single one of them thought he was somewhere on the gradient of a lying devilish patriarchal controller trying to trick or scam them. So at what point does a pattern of behavior stop being just: Oh, Lestat has suffered more than Christ, he never did anything wrong/bad to anyone~!, and more of an indication that this man is deeply troubled and needs an intervention ASAP--or at the very least a vasectomy. 😭😅 That's not about saying Lestat's good or evil, or flattening/reducing Lestat's character; it's seeing his red flags waving and the spinning Wheels on the bus go: Him, him, him! All fall down! 👀

And it becomes particularly annoying when Lestans try to reduce the conversation & critical analysis about Lestat's patently bad behavior as “bad man in relationship is bad” you just don't understand Gothic media let problematic characters be problematic~!, when what they REALLY want is for people to STFU and stop calling Lestat an ABUSER. 🎯 Just within the last 24 hours there was an entire fervor because certain Lestans tried to spoil/suggest/hint or make it seem like 3x5 would revisit The Drop in some way to minimize the domestic abuse Louis suffered at Lestat's hands during the Ep5 Fight. Abuse apologia & abuse denialism run rampant in this fandom, and many Lestans instantly take issue with anyone who calls Lestat's abusive behavior what it is, despite Sam Reid & Jacob Anderson BOTH confirming that what Lestat did in that house was indefensibly & unquestionably abusive.

So that kind of behavior on the other side of the fandom also doesn't help matters either, when we can't even have HONEST discussions about something as SERIOUS as abuse, without stans manipulating the narrative to act like anyone who calls a spade a spade isn't "Doing Analysis Right" because we haven't considered Lestat's mountain of childhood trauma. Like...no, I've considered it--I've seen his ABUSIVE father and ABUSIVE brothers and ABUSIVE mother. 💀 CYCLES OF ABUSIVE GENERATIONAL TRAUMA ARE CYCLING, just like Jam Reiderson said. 🤷‍♂️

I know this looks more like a colourful collage than anything useful at this point, but I did try to cram in all that happened over the past few weeks.

I'm so amazed by the amount of promo they're doing this time around. And yes, I have read and watched it all 😅

If you prefer something more organised, Ari puts together amazing weekly roundups of all the press coverage.

And as always, if you want to easily access all the links, here's a searchable PDF.

First off: WHY would Louis WANT to commit suicide when CLAUDIA IS STANDING RIGHT THERE? 🤨 Jacob already said that Louis was literally tryna PROTECT her (x x); why would he just throw his life away and leave her defenseless & alone with the man he just saw try to choke the life out of his daughter and break her leg? Louis' the same man who deliberately kept the painful rocks in his ankles to remind himself of the last time he failed to protect his daughter--oh sure, he'd just die right then & there when she's literally standing there?!

Second: This season is told from LESTAT'S pov, using HIS limited reasoning and HIS perspective of what went down, NOT the objective truth of what Louis was actually doing/thinking/feeling during that fight. This show revels in ambiguity, and skewed perspectives affecting interpretation & recontextualization. So TO LESTAT, maybe Louis saying "Let go of me!" really did sound like him saying KILL ME--TILL DEATH DO US PART. We already saw how STUPID Lestat's reasoning was about The Trial, so CLEARLY his lizard brain is never at 100% wrt what HE thought Louis was thinking/feeling. 🙄 Yes, Louis has ALWAYS been suicidal, and yes, I fully believe that he went head to head with Lestat thinking to himself that the only way Lestat would be able to hurt Claudia again would be over his dead body--that he'd fight to the death to protect her. But that doesn't mean that he'd just LET Lestat kill him just cuz he's sad & depressed. "Let go of me!" can just mean put me down, not literally CRUSH every bone in my effing body.

Third: Being Dropped from the sky CANNOT EVER kill a vampire; they're IMMORTAL. There is only ONE (1) way to kill a vampire, and that is to completely destroy their BRAIN (where AMEL lives), either by FIRE, or EATING it. So there is no way that Louis would've died during the Drop--he'd just be severely crippled for a LONG time before he healed. The POINT was that Lestat deliberately BROKE Louis, physically AND mentally/psychologically; assuring that he'd be too crippled to LEAVE Lestat to go to Europe with Claudia; and too mentally shook to ever think about tryna fight Lestat head on ever again (hence: The Murder Plot).

Fourth: Multiple things can be true at once: Louis could've been suicidal, but LESTAT was still the one who decided to fly them 2km up into the air WITHOUT LOUIS' CONSENT or ability to stop him & fight back; and LESTAT was the one who admitted that he Dropped Louis on purpose and WANTED him to break. Louis sitting on the Cloud Gift and choosing not to save himself from falling had zero bearings on Lestat's INTENTION for Louis to NOT come out of that Drop in one piece. And BECAUSE Lestat had no idea that Louis COULD save himself from falling, that means Louis never demonstrated his ability to fly to Lestat. So Lestat assumed that his Cloud Gift was a TRUMP CARD he could WEAPONIZE against Louis to deliberately hurt him. Which is ABUSE.

Fifth: AMC would literally have to retcon The Trial and say that Lestat's APOLOGY for the Drop was a lie/fake memory/wtvr. Because Lestat already admitted that he Dropped Louis on purpose, because he felt that Louis didn't love him, and he WANTED to "crush what you cannot own;" to hurt Louis physically just as badly as he was feeling emotionally.

Now that we got all that bullcrap out of the way, let's look at the LORE:

I've been said that Louis AND Claudia already had the Cloud Gift the entire time

Even before 3x3 aired showing Louis' Cloud Gift full force, I did my whole TVC vs AMC Cloud Gift meta analysis saying that the antigravity jumps/leaps LouClaud were doing was clearly an indication of their rudimentary base-level version of the Cloud Gift.

Because they obviously inherited it from AMC!Lestat, who already has the Cloud Gift before he made them, and passed it on to all of his fledglings. (I suspect that Nicki & Antoinette had it too.)

But here's the thing: 2 BIG factors that go into how a vamp can access the Dark Gifts are Practice & Blood. Just because they have the Gifts doesn't mean they can ACCESS them; and it certainly doesn't mean they come out the vamp womb already proficient--let alone AWARE--of their full potential with any Gifts.

Babies are naturally born with the bipedalism required to walk on 2 legs, and a lot of babies will sit up and start standing/walking on their own given time, but they still have to be TAUGHT how to walk, and they have to practice; and they have to eat the right food so their bones can grow strong enough to support their weight. Just cuz they inherited the ability to walk doesn't mean they can automatically just start walking whenever they feel like it.

It's the exact same thing with vampires, as my meta breaks down. We literally SEE Akasha teach Lestat how to use the Cloud Gift in QotD--he didn't just magically start using it instinctively.

Esp. since the Cloud Gift is CANONICALLY THEEE MOST UNCOMFORTABLE & SCARY GIFT VAMPS USE.

In the books, flight is THEE most terrifying sensation the vamps feel, since it proves just how physically inhuman they are. It makes them very depressed and sad for their lost humanity when the use it.

It's also one of the rarest gifts, and only VERY old vampires have it, or vamps who drank from very old Ancients. (Eg: book!Armand doesn't have it; book!Lestat doesn't get it until he drinks from Akasha in QotD.)

As I explained in my meta breakdown, book!Gabrielle had a whole scene with Lestat where he was teasing her about the Cloud Gift as he flew them someplace. He (astutely) said she probably already had the Cloud Gift after drinking from the Ancient vamp Sevraine; but Gabrielle was too scared to test the theory. So Lestat teased/threatened to Drop her and MAKE her test it herself under duress if she was too scared to try it on her own. She got very scared and told him to stop playing, and he apologized. So book!Gabs never tries it, but the indication is there that Lestat's probably right that she been had it and was just too scared to use it--unless he forced her to use it under duress.

So just because Louis already had the Cloud Gift in 1x5, that doesn't meant he was fully able to use it during the most frightening experience of his life, being lifted 2km in the sky (not even the tallest buildings in the WORLD are that high) by Lestat WITHOUT HIS CONSENT in the middle of a FIGHT; and having currently starved himself and then being DRAINED of the little blood he had as Lestat bit him all over (the same way the Fang Gang drained Lestat in 3x1 to weaken him):

TL;DR: Neat theory, but Imma need way more context

This is the same rotten fandom (sometimes even the same PERSON) insisting that:

the Ep5 Fight wasn't abuse at all (even though Sam AND Jacob said it was 1000x)

the Drop NEVER happened at all cuz Lestat's hairstyle was different

the fight wasn't Lestat's fault anyway cuz Amel was possessing him the whole time

Louis actually was the "aggressor" who "instigated" the fight cuz he didn't walk away or stop when Lestat asked him to cuz Lestat had his hands up and had stopped punching the hell out of Louis and biting him all over his face

Like...? ANYTHING to spread victim blaming abuse apologia & abuse denialism. 🤦‍♂️

So now people are acting like Louis being suicidal automatically absolves Lestat of FLYING Louis up into the clouds to break him in the first place??? And we're supposed to trust that that's the correct interpretation of a scene, or context clues or wtvr, when this fandom's already proven itself incapable of reading ABUSE AS ABUSE? 🤨 The same fandom already romanticising TF out of Magnus & Gabrielle abusing Lestat, calling Lestat Magnus' "paid companion", and saying Lestat having sex with GabriellA was "consensual"? 😬

@whattaworldwhattaworld thanks for the update!

I heard which biased screener was pushing this dishonest implication about the Drop, and I'M NOT SURPRISED. 🤣 The EXACT same abuse apologia abuse denilaism camp as usual; they're effing liars! 🙄 Like I said: ANYTHING to lessen Louis' victimhood at the hands of his ABUSER Lestat. 😒

They can't change the fact that The Drop happened and is here to stay; so instead they'll try to abuse their power as screeners to manipulate the fandom into looking at The Drop the way THEY want to, prepping everyone to go into 3x5 already expecting the Drop to minimize Lestat's accountability & pin more of the blame on HIS VICTIM--people in this fandom disgust me.

First off: WHY would Louis WANT to commit suicide when CLAUDIA IS STANDING RIGHT THERE? 🤨 Jacob already said that Louis was literally tryna PROTECT her (x x); why would he just throw his life away and leave her defenseless & alone with the man he just saw try to choke the life out of his daughter and break her leg? Louis' the same man who deliberately kept the painful rocks in his ankles to remind himself of the last time he failed to protect his daughter--oh sure, he'd just die right then & there when she's literally standing there?!

Second: This season is told from LESTAT'S pov, using HIS limited reasoning and HIS perspective of what went down, NOT the objective truth of what Louis was actually doing/thinking/feeling during that fight. This show revels in ambiguity, and skewed perspectives affecting interpretation & recontextualization. So TO LESTAT, maybe Louis saying "Let go of me!" really did sound like him saying KILL ME--TILL DEATH DO US PART. We already saw how STUPID Lestat's reasoning was about The Trial, so CLEARLY his lizard brain is never at 100% wrt what HE thought Louis was thinking/feeling. 🙄 Yes, Louis has ALWAYS been suicidal, and yes, I fully believe that he went head to head with Lestat thinking to himself that the only way Lestat would be able to hurt Claudia again would be over his dead body--that he'd fight to the death to protect her. But that doesn't mean that he'd just LET Lestat kill him just cuz he's sad & depressed. "Let go of me!" can just mean put me down, not literally CRUSH every bone in my effing body.

Third: Being Dropped from the sky CANNOT EVER kill a vampire; they're IMMORTAL. There is only ONE (1) way to kill a vampire, and that is to completely destroy their BRAIN (where AMEL lives), either by FIRE, or EATING it. So there is no way that Louis would've died during the Drop--he'd just be severely crippled for a LONG time before he healed. The POINT was that Lestat deliberately BROKE Louis, physically AND mentally/psychologically; assuring that he'd be too crippled to LEAVE Lestat to go to Europe with Claudia; and too mentally shook to ever think about tryna fight Lestat head on ever again (hence: The Murder Plot).

Fourth: Multiple things can be true at once: Louis could've been suicidal, but LESTAT was still the one who decided to fly them 2km up into the air WITHOUT LOUIS' CONSENT or ability to stop him & fight back; and LESTAT was the one who admitted that he Dropped Louis on purpose and WANTED him to break. Louis sitting on the Cloud Gift and choosing not to save himself from falling had zero bearings on Lestat's INTENTION for Louis to NOT come out of that Drop in one piece. And BECAUSE Lestat had no idea that Louis COULD save himself from falling, that means Louis never demonstrated his ability to fly to Lestat. So Lestat assumed that his Cloud Gift was a TRUMP CARD he could WEAPONIZE against Louis to deliberately hurt him. Which is ABUSE.

Fifth: AMC would literally have to retcon The Trial and say that Lestat's APOLOGY for the Drop was a lie/fake memory/wtvr. Because Lestat already admitted that he Dropped Louis on purpose, because he felt that Louis didn't love him, and he WANTED to "crush what you cannot own;" to hurt Louis physically just as badly as he was feeling emotionally.

Now that we got all that bullcrap out of the way, let's look at the LORE:

I've been said that Louis AND Claudia already had the Cloud Gift the entire time

Even before 3x3 aired showing Louis' Cloud Gift full force, I did my whole TVC vs AMC Cloud Gift meta analysis saying that the antigravity jumps/leaps LouClaud were doing was clearly an indication of their rudimentary base-level version of the Cloud Gift.

Because they obviously inherited it from AMC!Lestat, who already has the Cloud Gift before he made them, and passed it on to all of his fledglings. (I suspect that Nicki & Antoinette had it too.)

But here's the thing: 2 BIG factors that go into how a vamp can access the Dark Gifts are Practice & Blood. Just because they have the Gifts doesn't mean they can ACCESS them; and it certainly doesn't mean they come out the vamp womb already proficient--let alone AWARE--of their full potential with any Gifts.

Babies are naturally born with the bipedalism required to walk on 2 legs, and a lot of babies will sit up and start standing/walking on their own given time, but they still have to be TAUGHT how to walk, and they have to practice; and they have to eat the right food so their bones can grow strong enough to support their weight. Just cuz they inherited the ability to walk doesn't mean they can automatically just start walking whenever they feel like it.

It's the exact same thing with vampires, as my meta breaks down. We literally SEE Akasha teach Lestat how to use the Cloud Gift in QotD--he didn't just magically start using it instinctively.

Esp. since the Cloud Gift is CANONICALLY THEEE MOST UNCOMFORTABLE & SCARY GIFT VAMPS USE.

In the books, flight is THEE most terrifying sensation the vamps feel, since it proves just how physically inhuman they are. It makes them very depressed and sad for their lost humanity when the use it.

It's also one of the rarest gifts, and only VERY old vampires have it, or vamps who drank from very old Ancients. (Eg: book!Armand doesn't have it; book!Lestat doesn't get it until he drinks from Akasha in QotD.)

As I explained in my meta breakdown, book!Gabrielle had a whole scene with Lestat where he was teasing her about the Cloud Gift as he flew them someplace. He (astutely) said she probably already had the Cloud Gift after drinking from the Ancient vamp Sevraine; but Gabrielle was too scared to test the theory. So Lestat teased/threatened to Drop her and MAKE her test it herself under duress if she was too scared to try it on her own. She got very scared and told him to stop playing, and he apologized. So book!Gabs never tries it, but the indication is there that Lestat's probably right that she been had it and was just too scared to use it--unless he forced her to use it under duress.

So just because Louis already had the Cloud Gift in 1x5, that doesn't meant he was fully able to use it during the most frightening experience of his life, being lifted 2km in the sky (not even the tallest buildings in the WORLD are that high) by Lestat WITHOUT HIS CONSENT in the middle of a FIGHT; and having currently starved himself and then being DRAINED of the little blood he had as Lestat bit him all over (the same way the Fang Gang drained Lestat in 3x1 to weaken him):

TL;DR: Neat theory, but Imma need way more context

This is the same rotten fandom (sometimes even the same PERSON) insisting that:

the Ep5 Fight wasn't abuse at all (even though Sam AND Jacob said it was 1000x)

the Drop NEVER happened at all cuz Lestat's hairstyle was different

the fight wasn't Lestat's fault anyway cuz Amel was possessing him the whole time

Louis actually was the "aggressor" who "instigated" the fight cuz he didn't walk away or stop when Lestat asked him to cuz Lestat had his hands up and had stopped punching the hell out of Louis and biting him all over his face

Like...? ANYTHING to spread victim blaming abuse apologia & abuse denialism. 🤦‍♂️

So now people are acting like Louis being suicidal automatically absolves Lestat of FLYING Louis up into the clouds to break him in the first place??? And we're supposed to trust that that's the correct interpretation of a scene, or context clues or wtvr, when this fandom's already proven itself incapable of reading ABUSE AS ABUSE? 🤨 The same fandom already romanticising TF out of Magnus & Gabrielle abusing Lestat, calling Lestat Magnus' "paid companion", and saying Lestat having sex with GabriellA was "consensual"? 😬

IWTV Book Pages 114 - 115 (The Train Scene) Pt3 (Mind the Gap)

Ok so can someone PLEASE tell me WHERE--in the scene we saw with our own 2 eyeballs in 1x6, and the words Daniel said came from Claudia's diaries in 3x1 / 3x2--there is ANY PLACE in either version where Lestat threatens Claudia with RAPE? 🔍😭🙏🧐

Granted, there's 3 lines on Page 115 where it was just impossible for me to make out wtf was said, but even there, the jist seems to be that Lestat MOCKED her rape, but did NOT threaten her with it.

So there's multiple narratives going on:

The Train Scene didn't happen "as shown/told" -- no duh, Sherlock; Daniel already told us the pages were missing in 1x7--that is NOT a gotcha!

The Train Scene "never f***ing happened" AT ALL; the entire thing from start to finish is a big LIE (told by WHOM?) (cuz Sam Reid said there were fake scenes in S1 & Jam Reiderson argued about it; the logistics of the train stops & the position of the Earth at sunrise & the speed of a moving train in 1923 don't add up; Armand and/or the Talamasca planted fake scenes; etc etc)

The Train Scene DID happen--so Lestat (AND the Lestans) are lying/exaggerating/hyperbolizing/etc; there's just missing/additional frames, lines/dialogue--characters, even!--to be revealed (Louis was there with them the whole time, Antoinette was/wasn't there, someone DID accuse Lestat of threatening to rape Claudia (when???); Lestat was possessed by Amel the whole time so nothing's his fault actually the Devil made him do it; etc)

The Train Scene DID happen, but the context is totally different and everything that was seen/told takes on new meaning with a major plot twist (Lestat was crying when he's talking to her; Claudia's an evil manipulative liar who made Lestat look worse; Louis & Daniel & Armand are all liars too, etc)

Like.... I'm confusion, gang--what are we doing here? 🤨

Cuz it looks like Sam Reid & Lestat are being VERY insistent/consistent that the MAIN problem with the Train Scene is the accusation of RAPE; which ofc blindsides & hurts Lestat due to his own traumas wrt incest/rape/etc. But this whole "NEVER F***ing Happened" angle is being touted as this giant neon sign that the whole thing's a lie Claudia/Louis/Armand/Daniel/the Talamasca told IN THE BOOK, when even there that's not what was said either!

In season one, Louis is very deliberately framing Lestat as The Bad Guy… but things bleed through that show that Lestat did love & care for both of them. (While being undeniably toxic & fucked up.)

Claudia remembers the train scene as purely a threat, a coldness.

Lestat can legitimately remember it differently with identical words. Have none of you ever survived something dangerous as a child where your parent threatened to fucking kill you if you ever did something like that again?

Which is true? Does it matter? What Claudia felt was real, even if that wasn’t what Lestat intended. Lestat’s abandonment issues don’t make his unwillingness to let Louis & Claudia go any more acceptable.

THANK YOU.

I've been said that I really dgaf about the Train Scene--I just hate how Lestat (& the fandom/Lestans) act like the Train Scene not being 100% real/reliable/etc automatically absolves Lestat from being depicted & understood as a toxic abusive domestic terrorist. Eff the train, it coulda been Santa's Sled headed for the North frikkin Pole--at the end of the day it literally doesn't matter. Claudia was calling Lestat "Massa" BEFORE the Train Scene; cuz she already saw him as a slavemaster. She hated that he cheat on Louis with Antoinette (& that Louis stood by and let it happen); and she certainly hated how Lestat disrespected her grief over Charlie. The Murder Plot was inevitable, cuz Claudia had already made up her mind, determined to go to Europe & find her own companion by any means necessary, come Hell or high water. 🤷‍♂️

Claudia had already run away before, and for very valid reasons, cuz she hated being stuck in that house; Lestat called her a mistake who should've never been born and was keeping Louis away from him (an anvil dragging us down); and she blamed Louis for letting Lestat turn her into an immortal teen instead of taking her to a hospital (on top of being a weak-willed Pick Me who constantly stood aside & let Lestat mistreat & abuse them BOTH). She never even intended to stay at home as long as she did--she would've been gone in 1931, had Lestat not broken Claudia's leg & beat the hell outta Louis & Dropped him from the ozone layer; crippling him for who knows how long & assuring that Louis wouldn't be going anywhere anytime soon.

So the Train Scene's become this big ole deal in the fandom and on the show itself, as if nothing else Lestat did matters, when actually the Train was just the final straw that broke the camel's back; the last domino before the whole thing collapsed. It's another SYMPTOM, not the CAUSE of the rot in that family itself.

And I get so irritated when it's treated as something more than it is, especially when Lestat turns around in S3 tryna use it as a DEFLECTION in his long list of bullcrap ducking accountability for what a p.o.s. husband/father Claudia thought he was; and WHY Louis was convinced by Claudia (AND Armand) that he'd made the wrong decision choosing Lestat at all. Ok, Lestat got raped & has a ton of trauma & Claudia lied on him & Louis was withholding affection & etc. Doesn't change the fact that at the end of the day Claudia poisoned his arse and told Louis to put him in the incinerator, and was pissed at Louis for 5 whole YEARS of silent treatment cuz he refused to kill Lestat & choked TF out of her when she tried to burn Lestat herself. 💀You don't earn that kind of hatred out of thin air, for no reason. EFF the Train.

Its just like @belovedbright said about parents who get mad when their kids misbehave and threaten to kill them in the heat of the moment; then the incident's brought up again 15yrs later at Christmas Dinner and it's like they've got selective amnesia, insisting that that never happened they never said that etc etc, like...? Just cuz you didn't MEAN it that way doesn't change that someone TOOK it that way. So either sit down & talk it out & bury the hatchet; OR...kill each other. 🤷‍♂️

Sam Reid literally confirmed that WHATEVER happened, Lestat really was a "difficult b*st*rd" to her; so it's not like he's some bleeding heart angel of a father who NEVER did anything wrong whatsoever. He just never threatened her with RAPE. The scene itself is different, the context is different, but in essence is LESTAT'S A EFFING "B*ST*RD" TO HER, and Claudia was like: I need to KILL this dude. 💀

And this is LITERALLY what Rolin Jones said before S3 even started, that Lestat lacks introspection; he REFUSES to take accountability. Lestat's far more unreliable than Louis, because he is DELIBERATELY avoiding the truth about himself, Mr. There are No Delusions Here. 😂 Meanwhile Daniel's been snatching his wig all season.

Like, in the After Dark for 3x4 Sam Reid LITERALLY talked about how much Lestat PUSHES his wants & needs (& projects his fears) onto other people, and ignores other people's individuality in the process:

Lestat makes mountains out of molehills to deflect attention off his OWN actions, by harping on everyone else's REACTIONARY behavior towards things HE did.

Ok fine, you know what infinitesimal means (lie)--did you demean Louis' animal diet and reticence killing humans, yes or no?

Ok your hair was longer--did Louis teach you how to dress cuz "there's things you don't understand about America," yes or no?

Ok there were scars all over your chest--did Louis call you handsome & hot 1000 different ways cuz you seduced TF out of that closeted gay man to the rings of Saturn, yes or no?

Ok you didn't create the Wolverine Blues--did you chase Jelly Roll out of town cuz he was finna flake on Louis and that's why Antoinette entered your lives, yes or no?

Ok sex is only your #4--did you get PISSED at Louis for being too depressed to have sex anymore because you see your own value IN hypersexualization, yes or no?

Ok you didn't threaten Claudia with rape on the train--did you make the living conditions in that house so dang toxic and unbearable for her that she'd rather risk getting hemmed up by vicious vampires than spend another day holed away in 1132 with YOU, yes or no?

And again: the WORST we see of Lestat is from CLAUDIA'S pov, NOT Louis'.

I belly-laugh every time the Lestans glaze TF out of S3 Lestat: Zomg this is the Lestat I've been waiting 30 years for~! 😭 This is Lestat from the books~! This is the REal LeSTaT~! 😍 And I'm like: Bish, WHERE? 😂 You mean this manic coked out overstimulated AF bitter AF mean AF lying domineering crashout avoiding all of his demons and losing himself in the rockstar persona to pretend that it makes him happy or fills the void in his heart that's BEEN there ever since he was a little boy alone in that rancid chateau--THAT Lestat is REAL to you? 🤨 He's been putting on a performance this entire time! The only times we see even a GLIMPSE of the "real" Lestat in S3 is when he's either ALONE and miserable; or when he's with LOUIS--cuz DUH! 🤣 (If anything, S3 Lestat's been closer to the B-movie monster Louis cussed out in the 1973 interview, a la the book/film; than the FAR more charming version we loved & loathed in S1--let alone the absolute ROMEO he was as Dreamstat in S2--THAT is more "real" than this dude in S3.)

Jarda as the Gothic Double, EXACTLY! Esp. since he sees in real time how that dumb naive innocent was steadily corrupted & twisted by the depraved hedonistic life LESTAT introduced him to (from drugs to literal herpes; as well as making Jarda the fall guy for any & all crimes that ever get tracked back to Lestat); until he ultimately landed in the jaws of GABRIELLA. 🤢

The same way Claudia was the young Gothic Naif who was steadily corrupted & twisted by the "predator's upbringing" Lestat taught her, until she brought the LITERAL cops to their front door; and ultimately landed in the jaws of THE COVEN. 💀

And now Lestat has to live with seeing his traumas play out in front of him everyday with them both--he can't stand even being in the same room as Jarda; telekinetically blowing/flicking him away like a pest as if it's Jarda's fault that he's sleeping with GabriellA--SOFIA, pardon, since no one even knows who TF she is cuz Lestat's ASHAMED.

Likewise, Lestat can't even bring himself to face Claudia's trick-or-treaters; or to say her name out loud (unless he's deflecting the Train Scene to stop Daniel from prying too deep), cuz Lestat's ASHAMED.

GabriellA didn't want any human labels on her, and certainly didn't want Lestat de Patriarch tryna be her HUSBAND in that cringe AF Blood Marriage. He wanted to be her immortal companion, and gave her the ick, so she was immediately gone. ✌️ She wants FREEDOM--which IS similar to Claudia. But did GabriellA ever actually LOVE Lestat? 👀

Claudia genuinely loves her parents, and was happy as a clam during "the Easy Times." Even at the Trial, she was PISSED at Louis, but she STILL defended Louis when everyone mocked him & cried for him when the coven buried him alive. She was PISSED at Lestat, but she still hoped that he'd "come here for me" because he loved her enough to save her; and she still looked to him for help as she died--"You're my dad!" 💔

Claudia's a shining example of "Can't live with them, can't live without them." The problem is that "It's never been about me!" She realized she could never grow up or have a companion like Loustat had. She started resenting TF out of her dads when she realized they'd "cursed her" (as Louis called it) for their own selfishness--Louis wanted a kid, Lestat wanted Louis. But her blood feud against Lestat specifically festered as they stopped getting along anymore after all the nastiness he did & said to her during the Ep5 Fight; esp. when they both started competing for LOUIS' attention/affection.

So yeah, TO HIM, in Lestat's lizard brain, he probably did think Claudia was just tryna mock/control/hurt him by leaving--to flex her power cuz she knew how much it would hurt Louis if she left; and thus hurt LESTAT. So he'd take her leaving personally; not understanding her at all; the same way he didn't understand GabriellA at all. Sam Reid said Lestat & Claudia are so similar & have a "mutual respect" for each other (a la Vampire Pride), but sometimes istg it's like he's speaking thru a Lestat-pilled pov, rather than actually considering Claudia's interiority and what Bailey & Delainey actually said about Claudia's thoughts on Lestat. Esp. since for as much as Lestat "respected" Claudia as a killer who finally got the drop on him; he also infantalized TF out of her "the vampire tot." That is a surefire way to earn Claudia's eternal smoke.

TL:DR: Thank god he's pretty; I can't even

IWTV Book Pages 114 - 115 (The Train Scene) Pt3 (Mind the Gap)

Ok so can someone PLEASE tell me WHERE--in the scene we saw with our own 2 eyeballs in 1x6, and the words Daniel said came from Claudia's diaries in 3x1 / 3x2--there is ANY PLACE in either version where Lestat threatens Claudia with RAPE? 🔍😭🙏🧐

Granted, there's 3 lines on Page 115 where it was just impossible for me to make out wtf was said, but even there, the jist seems to be that Lestat MOCKED her rape, but did NOT threaten her with it.

So there's multiple narratives going on:

The Train Scene didn't happen "as shown/told" -- no duh, Sherlock; Daniel already told us the pages were missing in 1x7--that is NOT a gotcha!

The Train Scene "never f***ing happened" AT ALL; the entire thing from start to finish is a big LIE (told by WHOM?) (cuz Sam Reid said there were fake scenes in S1 & Jam Reiderson argued about it; the logistics of the train stops & the position of the Earth at sunrise & the speed of a moving train in 1923 don't add up; Armand and/or the Talamasca planted fake scenes; etc etc)

The Train Scene DID happen--so Lestat (AND the Lestans) are lying/exaggerating/hyperbolizing/etc; there's just missing/additional frames, lines/dialogue--characters, even!--to be revealed (Louis was there with them the whole time, Antoinette was/wasn't there, someone DID accuse Lestat of threatening to rape Claudia (when???); Lestat was possessed by Amel the whole time so nothing's his fault actually the Devil made him do it; etc)

The Train Scene DID happen, but the context is totally different and everything that was seen/told takes on new meaning with a major plot twist (Lestat was crying when he's talking to her; Claudia's an evil manipulative liar who made Lestat look worse; Louis & Daniel & Armand are all liars too, etc)

Like.... I'm confusion, gang--what are we doing here? 🤨

Cuz it looks like Sam Reid & Lestat are being VERY insistent/consistent that the MAIN problem with the Train Scene is the accusation of RAPE; which ofc blindsides & hurts Lestat due to his own traumas wrt incest/rape/etc. But this whole "NEVER F***ing Happened" angle is being touted as this giant neon sign that the whole thing's a lie Claudia/Louis/Armand/Daniel/the Talamasca told IN THE BOOK, when even there that's not what was said either!

In season one, Louis is very deliberately framing Lestat as The Bad Guy… but things bleed through that show that Lestat did love & care for both of them. (While being undeniably toxic & fucked up.)

Claudia remembers the train scene as purely a threat, a coldness.

Lestat can legitimately remember it differently with identical words. Have none of you ever survived something dangerous as a child where your parent threatened to fucking kill you if you ever did something like that again?

Which is true? Does it matter? What Claudia felt was real, even if that wasn’t what Lestat intended. Lestat’s abandonment issues don’t make his unwillingness to let Louis & Claudia go any more acceptable.

THANK YOU.

I've been said that I really dgaf about the Train Scene--I just hate how Lestat (& the fandom/Lestans) act like the Train Scene not being 100% real/reliable/etc automatically absolves Lestat from being depicted & understood as a toxic abusive domestic terrorist. Eff the train, it coulda been Santa's Sled headed for the North frikkin Pole--at the end of the day it literally doesn't matter. Claudia was calling Lestat "Massa" BEFORE the Train Scene; cuz she already saw him as a slavemaster. She hated that he cheat on Louis with Antoinette (& that Louis stood by and let it happen); and she certainly hated how Lestat disrespected her grief over Charlie. The Murder Plot was inevitable, cuz Claudia had already made up her mind, determined to go to Europe & find her own companion by any means necessary, come Hell or high water. 🤷‍♂️

Claudia had already run away before, and for very valid reasons, cuz she hated being stuck in that house; Lestat called her a mistake who should've never been born and was keeping Louis away from him (an anvil dragging us down); and she blamed Louis for letting Lestat turn her into an immortal teen instead of taking her to a hospital (on top of being a weak-willed Pick Me who constantly stood aside & let Lestat mistreat & abuse them BOTH). She never even intended to stay at home as long as she did--she would've been gone in 1931, had Lestat not broken Claudia's leg & beat the hell outta Louis & Dropped him from the ozone layer; crippling him for who knows how long & assuring that Louis wouldn't be going anywhere anytime soon.

So the Train Scene's become this big ole deal in the fandom and on the show itself, as if nothing else Lestat did matters, when actually the Train was just the final straw that broke the camel's back; the last domino before the whole thing collapsed. It's another SYMPTOM, not the CAUSE of the rot in that family itself.

And I get so irritated when it's treated as something more than it is, especially when Lestat turns around in S3 tryna use it as a DEFLECTION in his long list of bullcrap ducking accountability for what a p.o.s. husband/father Claudia thought he was; and WHY Louis was convinced by Claudia (AND Armand) that he'd made the wrong decision choosing Lestat at all. Ok, Lestat got raped & has a ton of trauma & Claudia lied on him & Louis was withholding affection & etc. Doesn't change the fact that at the end of the day Claudia poisoned his arse and told Louis to put him in the incinerator, and was pissed at Louis for 5 whole YEARS of silent treatment cuz he refused to kill Lestat & choked TF out of her when she tried to burn Lestat herself. 💀You don't earn that kind of hatred out of thin air, for no reason. EFF the Train.