Murf's Personals

The sheer JOY radiating from my body.

Louis gets to just enjoy a HARMLESS casual fling with a "nice guy" like Lemuel; without some uber-obsessive/possessive man breathing hellfire down his neck. Just. 👏 Like. 👏 I. 👏 Said. 👏

Like sure, everyone knows Louis' a freak who loves friction, loves Bad Boys, and who actually finds nice guys like Lemuel (& Jonah, & ofc Armand) boring/dull/flavorless. We all know Loustat's endgame, but jfc let Louis at least sample the platter before he puts himself in another long-term till-death-do-us-part commitment. Let him LIVE a little! And see what it's like to NOT be in a toxic AF failmarriage for once in his immortal life!

He said "THE MYTH AROUND HER" was misogynistic/regressive: that the sirens being women luring sailors to their deaths is misogynistic; that Helen being blamed for launching 1000 ships because of her beauty is regressive. And he's right! Everyone knows the ancient Greeks (cradle of Western civilization BTW) were misogynistic AF, and blamed women for literally everything (*cough* Pandora *cough*). Even the Bible blames Eve for the Fall of Man--that's what happens when you live in a patriarchy, DUH. Ofc the most beautiful hypersexualized objects of desire are loved & hated at the same dang time.

Even in the books it's CANON that Louis is the most beautiful vampire--so IDKWTF Lestans of all people (who claim they understand Lestat & love AMC!Loustat--LOL, lies) think they're doing tryna act like it's incorrect to see the parallels between Helen & Louis like????

"Beautiful One" is literally book!Lestat's favorite nickname for Louis! And AMC channels it all the time.

Jacob Anderson cosigns and even promotes the fandom embracing him/Louis as the most beautiful character that everyone would die for. 😍

So people need to stop acting like the Greeks never heard of Africa or met any Black people before or didn't have Black people in their myths, stop the cap! 🤣 The devil is a liar and they'll SWIFTLY get proven wrong every time (x x x).

Like, the ancient Greeks generally thought that the Lotus-Eaters Odysseus met were living in Africa (even though it's hard to tell wtf they were talking about, either--cuz Odysseus was wandering around the 1177 BC Bronze Age Collapse, FFS).

Homer literally said that Africa/Ethiopia was Poseidon's favorite hangout spot.

Like, what are we even doing here? 🙄😒

So just say you hate the very CONCEPT of Helen of Troy--the most beautiful woman on Earth--being a Black woman, or ANYTHING but white. 🤷‍♂️

Yeah, Helen of Troy was Spartan, but she was also hatched from an EGG that was inseminated in her mother by a BIRD, ffs. 🤦‍♂️🤣 Her being BLACK should be the least of people's problems. 🤨🙄🙄🙄

But they are abusive. Abuse is pretty much an entry level requirement for the gothic genre. It’s all about exploring taboo subjects but not necessarily imposing judgement on them and that’s precisely what she did. It doesn’t mean she’s a bad person. It doesn’t mean you’re a bad person if you like her characters. I actually wish passive exploration of abuse was more common than it is because it is fascinating.

In Anne’s work, there is constant abuse, and that is what it is. That is the word we’ve coined for dynamics like the ones she writes about. She just writes about them as if she were a passive observer, which is where half the appeal of the books comes from imo. It’s far more interesting to read about how characters respond to toxic dynamics rather than for author to hold your hand and tell you they’re bad. Labelling it abuse isn’t passing judgment on the books or the characters. It’s just a clearer word for what’s going on.

We know Armand is being abused by Marius because his emotional outbursts (amongst other examples) are the most obvious kinds you’d witness in a real child being abused as he was.

We know Gabrielle is abusing Lestat (neglect is abuse) because Lestat desperately fawns over her whenever she’s around to try and prevent her from leaving again. We also know because Anne had a real issue with how neglectful Gabi was and said so directly.

The characters give real life responses that abused people exhibit and the story only benefits from this. Anne’s vampires are so heightened yet they’re still so terribly human which is why they’re so powerful. She doesn’t need to tell you it’s bad because it’s horror. That’s sort of a given.

And there are obviously a thousand other examples. You can pick any character and analyse their actions and intentions and you’ll find abuse. Louis and Claudia is in an underrated example. That’s what the series is about. Ironically, the readers who insist this isn’t the case could probably benefit from Anne being a little more direct in her framing of it, but I don’t think she needed to be necessarily. I actually love when a book or other piece of media doesn’t directly call out whatever issues it’s dealing with. It’s far more elegant to explore the impact this behaviour has on the characters rather than to just say it.

And what cracks me up is how people will say "B-b-but trauma is different from abuse~!" 😩 and I'm like....? 🤨 As if trauma can't be caused by abuse? 🙄😒

All of these vamps live a long time, so their PTSD comes from a whole cocktail of abuses--physical, verbal, emotional, psychological/mental, neglectful, grooming, sexual, even substance abuse, etc. And like you said, Anne Rice has a way of not really stating the obvious--esp. because so many of her characters ARE traumatized, but trying to not dwell on it. And ofc Armand & Lestat are the best examples.

I was literally *just* talking about Dr Fareed giving Maharet new eyes, and there's a passage in Prince Lestat where you literally SEE Lestat get triggered and try to quickly push past it:

He's trying his hardest to not dwell on what was obviously a trauma-response to the rape (sexual abuse) he suffered under Magnus, when Magnus picked Lestat as his victim strictly because he had "the proper-color eyes" and hair. It's blink and you miss it, but it's there. Lestat is being triggered by things 200+ yrs after they happened; but folks wanna act like vampires have no concept of moral/ethical right & wrongs that they do to others, or are done TO them by others; and that people are crazy for calling out the things they do as abusive? 🙄🤦‍♂️

For example, in Interview with the Vampire Seasons 1-2, there's an instance of post-transformation Louis hearing Lestat's thoughts. Which, in the books, is impossible.

Vampires lose the ability to hear the thoughts of their own fledgelings in Anne Rice's vampire system, and vice versa. It's one of the tragedies of enduring eternity, that while you're falling in love with this mortal you're going to turn, you're privy to their thoughts, and even more so, during the moment of transformation you basically combine your souls, but then after that you're silent to one another, even while you can continue read the thoughts of other mortals and other vampires who aren't so closely "related".

Well, it turns out in S2 of IWTV that this wasn't an artistic difference or the showrunners' just forgetting Louis shouldn't have been able to hear Lestat's thoughts. It was a clue that Louis's narration was unreliable.

Which brings us to IWTV Season 3/The Vampire Lestat spoilers (through the Queen of the Damned book):

TL;DR: In the books, vampires CANNOT regrow limbs or missing eyes. EVER. Even if they had the eyes/limbs pre-transformation. book!Lestat got his whole eyeball ripped out, and Thorne donated his eyes. Neither grew back--they had to be given back their eyes by someone else, rather than just regenerating eyes on their own.

☝️ Correct.

So unless AMC!Armand's eye is being kept in a packet somewhere like book!Lestat's was, then no, it's gone for good. Like you said, replacement eyes inevitably start to rot, and it causes them great pain, and they can't really see too well out of them anyway (Maharet).

Because Anne Rice's vampires have human morals & ethics. Maharet was fine taking the human eyes of her victims cuz they were gonna die anyway when she'd eat them. But with other fellow immortal vampires, she thought it was hella unethical to just steal some stranger's eyes just so she could see again. Thorne GAVE his eyes to her voluntarily. So when Dr Fareed made her new ones, he took a human victim sentenced for death, artificially turned them into a vampire, took their vamp!eyes, killed the fledgling, and did a bunch of high tech surgical mumbo-jumbo to correctly implant the eyes in her so they'd work correctly--my linked post above explains why this is so important (SPOILER: extra deets why book!Armand's attempts to place vampire body parts on peoples' bodies failed).

So because AMC!Armand's only missing one (not BOTH), he probably figured it wasn't worth the hassle, and made-do with an eyepatch. 🤷‍♂️

Assad Zaman is a TROLL. 😂

But yes, those scars look hella fresh--like the stitches are still in or something.

I surmised here that I think it's highly likely that Akasha was involved somehow. There's no vampire we've seen oin the show who's as "near-indestructible" as SHE is. 💀 Armand's only 514yo. Poor Louis' barely pushing 100+ (and he's not even sunproof). Akasha is 6000yo. 💀💀💀 Not 6 hundred. 6 THOUSAND. She's 3x older than Armand's Maker Marius, who's one of TVC's most impressive vamps. So either AMC is gonna have the covens go after them the way they went after Lestat in 3x1, OR this has something to do with the Talmasca, OR we're dealing with The Mother of All Vampires. 💀 And she is perfectly capable of ripping off limbs with ease.

But even in the books it was totally possible for regular vamps to lose their heads, hands, arms, limbs, etc. And these body parts stayed chopped off--the wound will just heal closed if the limb isn't reattached. So with Louis, yes, the prosthetic required; his foot's gone. 😭

In the books, Dr Fareed had OP high tech cloning labs, where he was able to use vampire skin grafts to perfectly/miraculously re-make their missing body parts. We'll have to wait and see if AMC!Fareed can do the same thing. Otherwise, AMC's gonna have to arsepull a different solution, or keep the injuries as-is going forward.

Injuries "would simply regrow." NO. 😔

"Or you could reattach them and they'd just fuse back on and heal." YES. 👍 So long as you still had the eye/limb, you could fuse it back on. Vamp body parts don't rot--only the head (where their BRAIN is)

As for burning, that only counts for the BURNS themselves. Armand & Louis both set themselves on fire in the sunlight. Armand healed after draining a bunch of victims, and it took a hella long time. With Louis, Lestat-David-Merrick basically BATHED Louis in their blood, to heal his burns. Then Lestat fed him his super!blood directly, over & over & over again. In both instances, Loumand didn't have any missing limbs or anything; it really was just skin-deep burns.

Memory Is A Monster

As to your other point about memory, unreliable narrators, fake injuries, etc.

Yes, AMC totally tried to cover up the mistake they made in 1x2's writing by pinning it on Louis just misremembering if Lestat actually whispered to him or not. They got caught in a boo-boo and clumsily used Memory is a Monster as a crutch in 2x8.

Vampires still feel physical pain--and that would be extremely painful, it's not fakeable. Esp. with Louis' leg--that's a real prosthetic in a body part that he no longer has. 💀 Even if he kept his missing foot in a shoebox somewhere, you can't just casually reattach limbs & eyes like Velcro--the Blood will HEAL the injury. So they'd have to have the eye ripped out again. The limb torn off again. Why would they do that?

And who are they tricking? Everyone still knows who they are thanks to the book & documentary/songs--it's not like they're unrecognizable, or not vampires anymore.