Listen maybe I'm just wrong, the show does things all the time that I don't expect.
But I do really think that some people should potentially prepare themselves, if there is ever a return to the trial? For Lestat to be as involved as the show basically makes it look like he already is.
The evidence of Lestat having somehow been completely coerced into his participation, at least in the show, the way he is in the books? Simply not there.
That doesn't mean they won't say that he was. I can't control what the writers do or how they choose to frame or reframe things as the show moves forward.
But just a reminder, quick recap:
Lestat is moving through the theater of his own free will from what we see backstage onto the trial floor. He is shown as being in the real backstage part, not locked up or anything, and someone comes to get him to tell him its time for him to go onstage - he's not like, mind-controlled onto the stage.
It is also clear from the flashback we're shown at the end of s2 that Lestat was not mind-controlled into saying lines someone else was making him say; he was in the theater, with full bodily movement and an ability to snap back at Armand verbally whenever he felt like, rehearsing along with everyone else.
During the trial, he goes from being very confident and charming with the audience, to getting emotional once he actually turns and looks at Louis. Almost as if actually seeing Louis firsthand has affected him in a way he didn't anticipate or prepare for.
He gets more and more upset and emotional throughout the trial - not as if he is being controlled, but as if he is having an uenxpected meltdown in real time. Suggesting, at least to me, that he was not expecting the level of emotion he is now feeling, and doesn't know what to do about it now.
He goes off script once he gets to the part where he's talking about dropping Louis, and he's clearly crying about how he "broke him." Again, no one is mind-controlling how he's behaving on stage, and the sense is that he's almost talking to himself - he's changing what he was going to say in real time, due to sudden emotion.
He may attempt to save Louis, but crucially, he does NOT attempt to save Claudia. Unless there is some other reason for us to see that he is prevented from doing so? It's fair to say that he was okay with going through with it.
When Louis confronts Lestat in the tower while Lestat tells them he's "contemplating why he does what he does," Louis cuts in with "burn your daughter alive. rehearsed a play to burn your daughter alive." And Lestat doesn't argue. In fact he looks devastated. Not the devastation of someone who is being mind-controlled, whatever that would even look like. The devastation of someone who is being called out for exactly what the fuck they just did.
And let's not forget that if Lestat DOES think that Armand is as dangerous to Louis as all that, AND feels that it is his whole mission coming here NOW to save Louis from Armand... WHY WOULD HE LET LOUIS LEAVE WITH ARMAND. Not just then, but ever, in 77 years!? Why wouldn't he make some attempt... a MILLION attempts! In 77 years! To not get to Louis, get some message to Louis, get the truth to Louis somehow?
It's also weird to think about Lestat going through with the trial as a bad thing, and I don't say that in way way that exonerates him. I think Claudia should have lost her fucking shit and burned his ass alive.
But from LESTAT's perspective, this was not an everyday domestic dispute. These two connived and plotted and attempted to murder him. I feel like that gets so weirdly overlooked, in terms of what it would be normal, from his perspective, to want vengeance for.
Especially because he was already going to have Antoinette kill Claudia at the end of s1, because he knew she was plotting to kill him.
And that's not even to talk about how s1 frames Lestat as like, charismatic and engaging, but a complete and utter piece of shit, from the perspective of Louis and Claudia, in every scene.
The sort of weird fandom retconning of Lestat having always been innocent bugs me so much, because it's not true! Like if you want to have your dark twisted vampire family/romance, fine. But like. This is, one some level, what you've already gotten. Lestat was the Beast to Louis's complicated Beauty. Season 1 Lestat is entitled, he is chaotic and dismissive, he is cruel. He is racist as hell, and misogynist, unfortunately. If you want him to be the dark prince in the "fucked up gothic romance," as Daniel calls it. The dangerous if compelling love interest, that the heroine struggles to resist despite her better judgment, that is what s1 Lestat is!
And yeah. He's not suddenly going to completely 180 after they attempted to murder him and left him to die. Like why. Where is that idea coming from.
Until we get more information, every bit of evidence STILL points to Lestat being a huge murderous piece of shit, most especially to Claudia. Like, 99% of the time. There is literally only ONE episode out of all the episodes in season 1 that depict them as a relatively happy family. And both Louis and Claudia acknowledge she was a bandaid for an already bad relationship, and that episode was the new-family honeymoon period.
When we see Lestat up in the tower scene at the end of s2, he specifically says he's there to "contemplate why it is he does what he does." Why HE does it. He's returned to a place where he was harmed, and he's re-harming himself. He's not in that tower punishing anyone else, and we see no evidence he's being held prisoner there.
The idea that somehow the trial is the moment he is suddenly OUT of character, and that he would have to be mind-controlled or some other hand-wavey thing into participating in it... it doesn't really make sense with how they've written the show so far. Like, they could absolutely MAKE it make sense, if they wanted to. But so far, what the whole trial thing looks like is:
Lestat was contacted by the coven to see if he wanted to be a witness against one or more of his fledglings for his own murder.
He said, still understandably bitter, hell yes, and traveled back to Paris.
He practiced the play the entire time, for weeks (it might have even been months, if my timeline is correct). He's also probably equally pissed off when he hears about the fact that Louis had moved on, with Armand of all people.
The play arrives and he's totally convinced himself this is what he wants.
He arrives on stage, looks into Louis's eyes and sees him all beaten up by the coven, and the reality of what exactly it is he's doing suddenly hits him. Which then sets off a chain-reaction, where on stage in real time he's sort of realizing what a piece of shit he's been, at least to Louis.
He saves Louis from being murdered.
Watching Claudia die creates another "oh shit what the fuck what have I done this is too real" moment.
He freaks out, and probably runs away to the tower and just camps out there. (Unclear exactly what happens next, but again, doesn't seem like they're holding him prisoner in the tower. He's just... there.)
Louis and Armand visit him in the tower, Louis accuses Lestat of burning his own daughter alive, they threaten to kill him, Louis announces he's leaving with Armand.
Lestat doesn't tell Louis anything about Armand, because he doesn't actually know what Louis does or doesn't know about Armand's involvement anyway. But he does know that HE himself, Lestat, was involved. And feels this being left permanently is actually an appropriate punishment for what he almost did to Louis (really what he did do to Louis) and for what happened to Claudia.
He retreats back to New Orleans and just sort of rots away, because he can't live with what he did. Until Louis comes back to him, which feels like a type of forgiveness, and he feels that he can suddenly carry forward past or even through his guilt.
There is basically no current evidence that any of this didn't go down more or less this way. There is plenty of evidence and opennness FOR it to have happened like this.
Which means if we revisit the trial, this is either going to be how they handle it. Or it means that they're going to HAVE to introduce wildly new pieces of information to recontextualize it all
(Or secret third thing, where they are just not as good writers as people think they are. Which is real, I've been saying that since at least s2. But that's for another day.)
