#theirwolf replies

Jonathan is greatly distressed. It is not only that he feels sorrow, deep sorrow, for the dear, good man who has befriended him all his life, and now at the end has treated him like his own son and left him a fortune which to people of our modest bringing up is wealth beyond the dream of avarice, but Jonathan feels it on another account.

Earlier, Mina muses about her future wedding:

Lucy is to be married in the autumn, and she is already planning out her dresses and how her house is to be arranged. I sympathise with her, for I do the same, only Jonathan and I will start in life in a very simple way, and shall have to try to make both ends meet.

Mr Hawkins also says that he pretty much took both of them in. Mina says that she has never known "a mother or a father" and has felt that Mr Hawkins was a substitute for both. And we learn from early on that Jonathan was raised to manhood by him and he has no parents to write to. So they were literal Victorian orphans who he made his wards.

how dare the poor person want financial stability!

like, okay. I still think it would be a very classist and uncomfortable decision if the final film had been more like the 2016 draft where Ellen and Orlok did not have a pre-existing bond, and so Thomas going there is more of the first domino. but if they had, these statements would at least make more sense. but the moment Eggers decided to change it so that Ellen and Orlok already knew each other and he already staked a claim over her, that makes Thomas' "wealth motivation" moot.

ORLOK WOULD COME THERE NO MATTER WHAT.

honestly, Thomas doesn't even seem that money-driven in the film. he seems concerned about being in debt, about being of a much lower class, of how fragile his and Ellen's current financial status is.

(especially if you compare him to the incredibly unsubtle Thomas in 2023 who was worse than the 2016 Thomas.)

I find it incredibly uncomfortable that Thomas is the poorest/lowest class character - and his great sin and big character flaw is greed, with the filmmakers acting like his character arc is learning money cannot save him/them. especially considering the historical context of class in Germany/Prussia at the time.

I mean, it's hard to have sex with your wife if you don't have a home. just saying.

Really, though, the victim blaming going on with these takes makes me so frustrated. Even IF we ignore that Orlok already knows Ellen and feels entitled to her, even IF we ignore that he is doggedly determined (now that she's married to someone else) to show up and reclaim her for good - Thomas. Had. No. Choice.

Not to rant at you, anon, just using your ask to go off on this narrative.

The thing is - Thomas is already in debt at the start. That it's to his friend doesn't matter to Thomas. Honestly it might make the debt seem even worse. He is indebted to Harding financially, he and Ellen are not off to the most secure start, he's already been away for a while due to the honeymoon - this actually is vitally important for them. He needs his job. He was already late - if he hadn't been so late or hadn't realized it, he likely would have stayed home longer. But he couldn't. Then when he's offered this big, lucrative deal, he can't refuse it. Knock commenting about 'if you close this sale, you're job is guaranteed' isn't just tempting him with success, it's also threatening him with failure.

What happens if Ellen relapses and they're destitute? What happens if Ellen is having her seizures again, the sleepwalking, the melancholy, what if it gets worse? Ellen of course is still in the sweet honeymoon phase and thinks that love will be enough to stave those things off because so far Thomas' mere presence and affection has worked. But the thing is, that high is going to come back down. It happens in even the most wholesome and genuine of relationships, and stress - especially financial stress - will not do them any favors. Will not do her and her mental health and her attempts to keep her bond with Orlok suppressed any good whatsoever. I mean, that's basically what is happening in the film. The more they struggle financially, the more desperate things get, the greater the fissures and cracks that form in their marriage, giving Orlok more opportunity to come in and use it against them. Which is quite literally what he does. Thomas staying home, refusing the job, etc., only changes the how and when.

Ellen doesn't quite get it because based on what we know of her background and her father, she's never struggled to make ends meet, she's struggled with wealth and status being used against her. Of course she comes at this from the angle of 'being in a wealthy household didn't protect me', which Thomas can't understand. Neither can Ellen understand Thomas' perspective of being in debt to someone, worrying about failing to provide. I don't think it's simply that Thomas wants to make Ellen comfortable and have a life like she used to - he quite literally is worried that he cannot provide for her at all, especially if she gets sick (mentally or physically).

Like, Thomas in the 2024 movie isn't solely and completely driven by financial success - if you contrast him in the film with how Eggers originally wrote him in the 2016 script or how he's portrayed in the 2023 remake, this Thomas comes across to be more of the mindset that 'having financial success and being of similar standing to Ellen and Friedrich will make everything fine and I will be good enough to deserve her love and his friendship.' The driving factors are really that Thomas a) wants everything to be will for him and Ellen and b) wants to live up to the rigid societal standards of his gender. He's insecure, and he's overcompensating. Which isn't great but is a relatively normal character flaw, and certainly isn't one that is so inherently damning. His love and concern for Ellen still factor into things. He's not turning into a money-obsessed, toxic masculinity-minded asshole or something of the sort. That's why as soon as he's no longer naive to this darkness in the world - the things that Ellen has known of all along - his motivation shifts entirely to protecting Ellen. He understands now that unfortunately, in this rigged, supernatural game they're all trapped in, money means nothing. Money can't save Harding and his family, it certainly won't save Thomas and Ellen. But even IF he had known that all along - it wouldn't have made a difference.

Thomas and Ellen still need to live, Thomas would have to leave for work, and would have to take that job that sends him over to Transylvania. And if somehow they could circumvent that? Orlok still would find a way to separate them. Orlok would still come to Wisburg. Thomas is not the hero in this story, he's the damsel in distress, and unfortunately for him, while he gets to make it out alive, the actual hero who saves the day does not. Thomas loses his wife, but that is not his fault. It's not his fault he got assaulted, traumatized, left for dead, and it's not his fault he couldn't save Ellen. It's not his fault she died.

Ellen was doomed long before she met him, and that wasn't her fault, either.

All I will say is this. There is a reason why German filmmakers of the post-WW1 and post-WW2 eras do not treat Thomas/Jonathan's money concerns as flaws, but rich US filmmakers do.

OH. oh this might explain a lot. it all goes back to Francis, huh? thank you, anon, for letting me know about this! I'm so glad that stuff was cut, though poor Jonathan still got treated so badly in that movie. (give me Mina and paprika loving Harker!) Okay, to be fair, Jonathan Harker has always been kind of the weakest part of Dracula adaptations, but FFC's version to me seemed to be the first one made to truly dislike Jonathan.

absolutely! sdfdas thank you for asking! it's still in the early stages but basically it's a fantasy/horror AU with a few elements of The Little Mermaid.

Ellen is a mermaid fascinated with humans and life on land and ends up seeing Thomas on a ship and gets curious, but there's something else that really sends her to the surface - a voice from the dark, dark depths that calls to her but scares her.