raye sneq

devils minion isnt doomed bc they cant really love each other, and it isnt a rascally walk on the wild side: its the AIDS era and all of a sudden gay love is very much normal love, but what dooms it is circumstance

and everything in that chapter is a part of gay life, gay marriage, gay culture. ballet. philosophy. domesticity. exploring the world together and revelling in everything, everything two people can enjoy together. a compressed vision of a whole community, a whole generation. making a dream home together, filled with art. making friends. introducing each other to new things, sampling all of life together. its like a little zip file of the potentialities of gay life. and the threat waking up isnt their fault or a feature of their 'unnatural' love - its unrelated. AIDS happened. akasha woke up. not a moral judgement on them as they gorge themselves on pleasure and delight. daniel is terrified hes going to die; armand realises he cant be saved. daniel is immortalised as a beautiful young man, katasterized, frozen in time like so many others

stonewall riots: 1969.

AIDS identified: 1981.

i've talked a couple times now about how i think anne rice via lestat's narration used the word 'minion' in a distinctly queer sense: equivalent to mignon, it was term used for a powerful man or monarch's male favourite or gay lover.

👆

Is the lack of streams or discussion of the songs hurting your feelings? … fuck off. Adress the racism or stfu

They cut Lestat being the breadwinner of his family, something that was integral to the dynamics in the first two books (both because it was a representation of how proactive he is as a character (the major contrast between him and Armand, while also being the reason why he got Akasha and Marius’ attention) and because of the conflict between him and Louis, Lestat being impoverished old money who grew up having to put food on the table and barely getting an education pre-turning while Louis was (in Lestat’s eyes) new money and very rich through no work of his own (being a plantation owner)

Book!Louis spends most of early iwtv bragging about how he is the one keeping Lestat in luxury and feeling superior because of his early education (despite Vampire!Lestat being his equal)

The show made human!Louis a selfmade bread winner (being a black man in Jim Crow America and becoming a pimp because the plantation money had run out) to make him a more dynamic character, which was over all a good choice when you’re writing a tv mc, book!Louis being an avatar of parental grief and depression is a big reason why he has so little screen time in later books

The problem is that the writers (presumably, based on what they did) decided that they couldn’t have both of the main characters sharing that trait (which would have made for an interesting “started at similar points but chose to go in different directions with it” dynamic), instead deciding to make Lestat a passive character who never decided to (with Gabrielle’s support) take the reins over his own life by becoming the head of the family he couldn’t escape, instead just staying at home for an additional decade, even changing his escape to Paris to being something public and planned enough that Nicki’s father gave him meeting instructions

Taking some of Lestat’s positive traits away in the show could be a good thing, considering his book version is notoriously a bit of a Gary Stu, except for the fact that him being so proactive is what is supposed to be the impetus behind most of the major events in this story (see above about his dynamic with Armand, Akasha and Marius)

“You can’t script a Hurricane” says Armand in the show, echoing a consistent sentiment throughout the books, only for Lestat to be consistently pupeteered by multiple characters throughout AMC’s series, Armand, Gabriella, even Marius leaving him in charge of Akasha for a decade (to go on holiday?) before he decides to try feeding her his blood

my thoughts under the read more

These things either are too expensive and the purpose of the scene can be established via a different scene, or it has no narrative or character purpose and is a waste of time and money. I’ll also explain why I chose the scenes as a waste of time and/or money:

• Concert #1 w/Lestat sloshing his pants:

The purpose of this concert is to establish the new feel of the show, the genre switch (it is a sub-genre switch) and to introduce the band members. But these things could have been accomplished another way. Not only is the feel of the season unpalatable, the band could have been introduced when Lestat barged in on their practice. Think of the scenes in terms of an itemized invoice.

There is the set design, materials + labor, sound labor, wardrobe materials + labor etc

The venue or “setting”, which is either built with materials +/or rent + labor/maintenance + on call safety

Crowd extras, with maybe a few dozen at any given time. Yes, they could throw in some crew to fill in the space, but crew is needed for other things. Extras cost money.

The actors, during the first concert alone is SR, 4 band members, EB, manager actress, and BJ EB. Possibly the other two vampires as well.

• Baby Jenks + Elevator + OD

By the end of the season it is clear that Baby Jenks only served 1 purpose, and that purpose could have been given to another character. She was meant to distract/dose Lestat so he could be attacked by the CoD. We have several scenes with her where that time could have been given to Daniel, Armand, or Louis.

Baby Jenks in the crowd + onstage to be drained. Time is money, sets and settings and film is money + labor.

OD scene is unnecessary and has no narrative use. She warns Lestat in a sense, but this warning is not needed as the season does not pay off this warning from her soul/ghost. The Failures do not need to be pre-cognitively spoken to us or Lestat. There is no moment later on when her warning feels like a proper foreshadowing.

Elevator sex scene: You have several actors, a new set design, a new camera set up, and likely the need of an intimacy coordinator. RJ specifically noting that he brought the bell boy in before AMC could say no feels like a pathetic ploy for LGBTQ+ points in a show that is already respected in that demographic. There is no reason for this elevator foursome.

The role of Baby Jenks could have easily been given to Dee. Dee could have drugged Lestat, could have been distracting him at the party etc.

• Hotel Hall Vampire Fight

I’m confident stating that this scene could have been rewritten to be a more isolated, maybe 2 on 2 altercation. Or 3 on 1 until Daniel arrives. But the real take away here is that the scene accomplished nothing that can’t be handled another way. Lestat fleeing to reunite with Gabriella could have been done via him fleeing to the tour bus alone, while Gabriella waits for him. Why does he flee? Because he’s an emotional basket case and he’s lonely and miserable and missing Louis and his mom. It’s not that complicated to let character motives lead the way.

Hallway fight is another set which means more materials + labor. There are also several actors, along with stunt doubles and action coordinators. Special effects are also used here.

The window flight, even with green screen, is more labor + equipment for flight.

• Gabriella and Lestat: Strip Club & Flight

We already know Lestat can fly, so we once again are wasting money on equipment and coordinators, when this time and money can be put in better, more narratively fleshed out scenes. We did not get the tower fight or the carriage being destroyed, but we got this and the strip club? This choice feels like poor planning, writing, and tbh poor money management. What purpose does the strip club serve, except to show us that Gabriella wants the GC and is attracted to women? This can be accomplished on the tour bus, without the need to build more sets, film on locations, or pay for more unnecessary labor. Since I’ve been repeating a lot of the same cost breakdowns, I’m not going to do it every time. But the big one is always that time is labor, and labor is always ALWAYS a huge cost that most companies want to cut.

• Magnus music video

I suppose this scene is liked well enough because it gives us some levity. But my argument against this scene is that 1- it’s not telling us anything about Lestat we don’t already know (he lies and hides and doesn’t talk about his past) and 2 - it’s not building Magnus up as a character so much as it’s making light of his predatory obsession with Lestat. Which isn’t a bad thing, but it should MEAN something to justify the signed check for bringing such an unnecessary scene to life, and it simply does not meet the criteria that would make it so.

• Lestat crashing the car

I don’t think this needs to be elaborated on much. The scene was shot using practical effects, which can be costly with materials and, again, that word that companies hate: LABOR. Lestat very well could have trashed the tour bus. He could have played a real life rock star and destroyed a hotel room. We didn’t need this scene. We already know Lestat is about to break down via the previous scene re: Nicki’s death.

• Armand’s AA meeting

No payoff, no purpose. What is he addicted to? We are not given any subtext to go off of. I suppose we could call the stalking a form of addiction, but the correlation to a need for AA isn’t there. We are not presented with the stalking as a thing that is hurtful to Armand. It is presented as romantic. Therefore, what exactly is Armand addicted to? We also could assume the only purpose of the AA meeting is for Armand to meet and use Alex for his plans. However, once again costs should contribute to this decision. Another set, more crew, more film, more hours. Armand could have met Alex any other way.

• Lestat and Armand tour bus bullshit

I hate this scene because it tells us nothing we don’t already figure out by the time we get to the concert and the big boss song. Luckily this time, the tour bus is already there. The shower is already there. But! Now we need possibly another intimacy coordinator session for Lestat’s nudity. We need time and crew and the scene gives us nothing for character development either. We learn nothing new that matters later. Armand warning Lestat about the GC and the other vampires means nothing by the time we get to episode 7.

• Bowling alley meltdown

The scene itself isn’t exactly a waste, but it becomes a waste because of the trash dialogue. The implications and outright “confirmation” re: Daniel’s turning are highly suspect here, as this is from Lestat’s POV. IMO, we didn’t need bowling as part of the season either way. It’s silly and unnecessary.

• More concerts because a few weren’t enough…?

This is more a general thing because we truly did not need this many concerts. As stated before re: Lestat’s first concert- it’s expensive, and narratively gives us nothing new we didn’t already know.

• Lestat burning in the sun repeatedly for…?

This is scene makes no sense because we spend the season with Lestat not showing how much he loves music. Suddenly he wants to hurt himself to get one thing in one song right, according to his standards. Costly, unnecessary, silly.

• Regina. Just everything Regina.

As much as people love Delainey, the Regina character was absolutely unnecessary with how things turned out. Her purpose being only to torment Louis per Armand- this doesn’t fit with anything else in the season or previous ones. Not to mention a lot of her dialogue is awful chat gpt trash. They could have made her into a vampire by the end, and give her an original plot that involves the next season QOTD. I mean, she is a woman, she has been jerked around by two male vampires- is there any reason for her to not be on Akasha’s side? She could’ve served a purpose, but what they did with her feels like an ass pull in the worst ways.

• Butcher shop

Not only is this scene horrendous for all the reasons many of us have already spoken of, but for budget reasons it is also unjustified. What do we find out here that even matters? That Armand was 12 when he was sold? That’s it. That’s the only new thing we actually need from this scene. Yes, I believe Louis and Armand needed to have it out about everything, but this doesn’t qualify or meet those expectations or needs. There is no build up to this scene, Louis and Armand don’t show any lingering resentment or hurt re: their companionship ending, and we don’t see them before this scene even hint at a desire to at least fight things out between them. They have SO MUCH to discuss. They don’t owe each other anything, but they were together for almost 80 gd years. This scene doesn’t come close to the weight their relationship actually holds to each of them. The set, the time, the reshoots, the labor- it all adds up and for not much use or purpose.

A lot of Claudia fans (Black and non-Black) flatten her character into some man-hating angry Black Woman. Their analysis of her character never goes beyond how much she hated Louis, how Louis 'dragged her around everywhere' and then hyper-focus on her relationship with Madaline, often at the expense of Claudia herself (much like Loustaters' interest in Louis never extends beyond their preoccupation with Lestat).

For many of them, their adoration for Claudia erases other elements of her character (her love for reading, theater, Charlie, her previous family and life before her vampirism, and how that was shaped by Jim Crow laws and white supremacy in general), but most especially including her complicated relationship with Louis.

Claudia being Black is just a cosmetic element for them, and as I've learned, Book Claudia-stans are often super-imposing five-year-old Claudia's personality onto her, but warped to fit their shallow "Justice for Women, Kill All Men" aesthetic (as it's not even a politic based in any kind of reality besides memes, vibes, and racism).

There was never any way they wouldn't enjoy that ghost scene regardless of how it flattened Claudia's character, because this is the culmination of how they've always seen "the real" Claudia.

Anything else about her character they've ultimately dismissed as "Louis making himself look better". The character remains stunted in their meta or fanfiction (though not in their eyes) because they cannot see Claudia beyond "It's never been about me" / "the stormy romance of you two" / "shingle blown off the roof".

For them, AMC Claudia, as a Black woman, is nothing but a miserable and angry person undefined by anything except how much harm was done to her. That's how a lot of Black characters are seen through a lens of whiteness: Miserable, downtrodden figures.

This also extends to Lesdaughter. Their analysis of their relationship erases that Lestat foremost always saw Claudia as expendable if it ultimately came down to choosing what he thought would maintain his idea of a relationship with Louis. We're talking about a man whose ultimate insult to his fledgling was setting her and her brother/father to be lynched by white vampires and human onlookers.

They do so much revisionism when it comes to how Claudia saw him post-Charlie (by erasing Charlie altogether) and use elements that only affirm their adoration of Lestat. (They're on twitter right now boo-hooing that Claudia never calls Lestat "daddy" in Jim Crow America, and ignoring that she calls him "Uncle Les" also as a denial of any right to parenthood he might've had before making her watch Charlie burn, beating Louis half to death, and trying to kill her and Louis).

The Vampire Lestat does this in spades for them by constantly reducing Claudia to the worst moment of her life (the rape the writers decided would "toughen her up") just to draw comparisons to her and Lestat. Nasty work.

Beyond that, Lesdaughter is also just a shallow understanding of daughters with abusive or difficult mothers, and largely tries to recuperate Lestat into the kind of pusedo-mother figure he never was in the series beyond their own imaginations.

All this to say, how many people see Claudia is often the opposite of who Claudia is. It's the complete opposite of how you hear Hayles talk about the spectrum of Claudia's ability to love and feel for the people she cares about. How she handles her anger toward Louis and how she presents that anger to Louis (with consideration to his PTSD) even when their relationship is at its lowest points.

This actress sees how people talk about Claudia, how they reduce her to this miserable figure, and tries, in the most professional way possible, to push back against that. She wants people to see Claudia as something other than just being angry at her father/brother figure, or just angry, and very few people - from the critics to the audience - don't seem capable or interested.

I don't know how you watch Claudia watching Grace de Pointe du Lac walk away from her brother, have the realization of the why behind her creation (one aspect of it), and assume, even as their relationship shifts and goes through hell, that Claudia does not understand her father/brother and does not love him. This is the same woman who looked past the fact that her lover sheltered and slept with a Nazi and loved her anyway. That's the kind of love (and arguably forgiveness) Claudia as a person is capable of.