My Mind in a Nutshell

AUTUMN: I want to shoot over to Ryan here, because I know that obviously Alex leaves, he's easy fodder for Armand then to sneak in and do all of his manipulation on and everything... but it does seem that within the band Salamander is the one who is most intrigued and enraptured by the Gremlin. I mean, what do you think that he thinks about– or what would he think when he finds out, if he does find out that Armand chose Alex to be the mole instead of him? He seems ready for it.

RYAN (SALAMANDER): It's interesting that that's the read on Salamander, because when I was playing it, I wasn't playing it that way at all. I was playing that my two loves were Lestat and Noah. Cause Noah in the book brings me– l mean there's one mention to me in the book-

SEAMUS (ALEX): And you mean Noah Reid, not Larry, specifically?

RYAN: Not Larry. (Laughs) | really messed up... I can't get out of character. Yeah it's interesting because in episode 4 when we're running through 'Big Bus'= 'Big Boss', you can't see, but in one of the drawings, it's the big bus running over Armand. I think Salamander will be bummed when he finds out that he's responsible for Larry's death. But I think he's just down to clown. For Salamander– I think people like Salamander very rarely get turned into a vampire, so he's just along for the ride.

AUTUMN: Once he's there, he's just in it.

RYAN: Like I've been trying to explain Salamander's gender and sexuality... he's a try-sexual. He will literally try anything. But you'll notice when we were shooting, that I'm really close to Larry. Salamander and Larry, they're really close friends in the dynamic. I'm always sitting next to him... it's devastating for him when Larry dies.

Makes me think of what he said to Daniel before Lestat’s show in the books 👀

EXTREMELY HAWT...

One thing that Season 3 is doing INCREDIBLY successfully story-telling wise is making us feel how AWFUL social, emotional, and physical isolation is, and how it can turn us into the worst version of ourselves, and the most vulnerable.

Lestat? I mean, his entire story is just that. Louis, feeding his grief of Claudia on Regina and fracturing his sense of reality by diving in too deep. Daniel, becoming the worst journalist he could be because he's trying to feel like he's worth something and maybe this puff-portrait of Lestat will prove his worth. Armand... not wholly clear quite yet. The band, literally becoming vampires and isolating from the real world for months without touching ground and interacting with the outside.

Like, you really feel the horror and anxiety of what it's like being in Lestat's head. It's exhausting, I'm exhausted, and I genuinely have to give the writers room kudos to making the FEELING of Lestat be so tangible I feel his loneliness, too. "The wheels on the bus go me, me, me" is a result of his childhood trauma. Narcissism is his vampiric coping mechanism, and it blinds him to what he does and what he appears to others.

Just, genuinely really impressed with how easy it is to really GET how we get the worst versions of these characters. when you have no one to love or trust or rely on, you feed on your worst habits and traits. I think it's why episode 5 really feels like a turning point to me, because we see (some of) these characters reaching out for a connection, and actually getting it.

On the other, I want Daniel to metaphorically losing his head (i.e. madness*) and Armand going scorched earth because of it.

Basically I want to watch Armand unhinged.

it’s late, it’s early, and daniel’s eyes start to burn. like good drugs. like too much sunlight. like cutting onions. he’s sure his irises must be glowing red, maybe orange—day old citrus peel, lit cigarette, marigold, traffic cone, garibaldi fish. they must be on fire. like the eyes of the stray cat he feeds when it comes slinking in through his window at home. staring at him while it licks at the chipped saucer of milk daniel leaves by his door. he doesn’t name the cat. he doesn’t tell the cat his name.

he didn’t ask the student tonight for his name either. took his glasses off so things could be out of focus. the reading had been shit. he’d been doing lines in the bathroom before and then stumbled over the word “solipsistic.” but the twenty-something stunner in the front row watched him moon-eyed anyway. no accounting for taste.

I have been devoted to you for 52 years and diverted obstacles which might elevate your suffering?

Lestat lays with his mother, that could be some good documentary material?

Rotten because Marius thinks he showered Armand on gifts and affection and gave him too much. A rich man’s child. Sweet but terrible. Spoiled.

Rotten because he’s undead and rotting from the inside out.

Rotten because he rotted his tears away in a dungeon under a church.

Rotten because of Santino who twisted his mind into something unrecognizable.

Rotten because Arun was never an enlightened being.

Rotten because of his desires as a child under Marius’ care.