Define “bad”? Problematic for sure. Squicky for some ppl. Cracky as heck.
I wanted to delete this ask bc an objective “bad” is so hard to define, especially with regard to fiction in this current wave of scrutiny about it. I think we can all agree on things that are bad in Real Life, but what we’re not agreeing on these days is the role of fiction and Real Life, that consumption/depiction of problematic things =/= endorsement of those things in Real Life.
(This is all aside from the criticism dealing with the writing itself on its own merits, which, I am pretty forgiving about. I don’t consider my palette as a reader to be all that refined, I’m more interested in the ideas, and I don’t mind as much about the skills of the writer, even one who may have been very good and then devolved over the years. So you’ll have to ask someone else if the writing style is your concern.)
Some books will be loved by some ppl and praised to high heaven, those same books despised by others and cursed for existing, and everything in between.
IDK we used to call the later books “the Vampire Crackicles,” and I for one, would love to bring that back!
At its core, it is my belief that VC as a whole is a means of demon exorcism and of wish-fulfillment for their author. Sure they have some higher value, if they didn’t, I don’t think the fandom would be as large and as loyal. But VC also has a ton of various kinds of porn, let’s be honest. As a mix of those elements I just described, they do not have to be that deep, they are whatever each individual reader wants them to be. Personally, I really enjoyed the first few, and have found enjoyable stuff even in the crackiest of later canon. If you don’t take them too seriously, it’s worth the effort. But then, I am pretty forgiving and I can do headcanon gymnastics for fun to explain stuff I don’t like, or treat it as AU.
So they can be considered shallow escapism with problematic dysfunctional hipster vampires:
Or, you can dive in and look for deeper meaning, and make richer analysis out of it. It could be that deep, if you want it to be!
When I got this ask ~6 months ago, it was close to Thanksgiving, I had more pressing real-life things going on like traveling and visiting with family. I also didn’t want to answer it bc I was thinking it might be from a troll. Might be someone asking this in order to trick me into some kind of response that could be a launching pad for Discourse.
Now, time has passed, and having absorbed plenty of fiction =/= reality, anti-anti-shipping, and pro-shipping blog posts, I’m not afraid. Of the two possible approaches above (and there are others, of course), you don’t need to pick a side. Sometimes it can be deep, and sometimes not. You don’t have to defend liking it one way or the other, it’s fiction. It’s whatever any individual reader wants it to be, and keep that in mind when you read. Your reading is your own. Your headcanon is your own. Don’t let ppl concern-troll you, policing what you enjoy in fiction. I’m being a little forceful here bc I want to give you the confidence to know and believe: You. Can. Read. AND. Write. Whatever. You. Want.
Anon, you might be a troll, but this is also an honest question ppl have had about this series over the years. I want to believe you’re coming to this honestly and not trying to start something.
I feel like I’m going to get redundant… to wrap up, the most recent and I would say, the Crackiest of the Crackicles, advertised as:
“There is always room for one more vampire novel.”
I think that’s definitely possible, in the context of the movie version of the story.* “[Lestat] knew me, he knew I would love her more than the waking world.” Very poetic *u*
Expecting a child doesn’t necessarily mean you love kids, BUT, Lestat could read minds, and perhaps he knew just how much being a father meant to Louis. Louis doesn’t speak much of his own father, when he died, Louis had to take over the family business at a relatively young age, so maybe Louis was really looking forward to being a better and more loving a father than the one he had grown up with ;A;
PLUS, it seems like it would have been Louis’s first child, making him a father for the first time. I can’t imagine what that must feel like, expecting to have your wife back in your arms, and a new baby to love and raise, and then get neither back, knowing your wife died in pain?? ;A;
Even if Louis wasn’t a kid person, I mean, how can you not love a super cute 5 yr old angel like Claudia was originally? Scooped out of abject poverty and sickness, someone you could lavish with gifts and who would be grateful for it, having known only the barest no-frills of a life before? Lestat knew Louis would feel protective of her, she could be something to inspire him to learn to live again. You can experience the world anew with them as they learn about it ❤
*In the book version, it’s a younger brother that Louis had lost recently, Paul, a brother Louis was very close to. The death sends Louis spiraling into guilt and depression bc he feels responsible for it (and others, including his own family, blame him for it directly).
When Paul died, Louis says: “my mother told everyone in the parish that something horrible had happened in my room which I would not reveal; and even the police questioned me, on the word of my own mother.”
That feeling of blame in the situation is part of what made that loss so devastating to him, the death was preventable, if only he had had more patience with his brother ;A;
But with the loss of a child and wife in childbirth, I can imagine the husband feeling responsible for that, too. After all, if not for him, well, she wouldn’t have been pregnant (we’re assuming it was definitely his baby!) 😛
I’m pretty flexible with canon. A fanfic might choose to disregard everything after QOTD, and I can accept that when I’m reading that fic, or there could be fanart of stuff from PLROA and I can accept that at that time.
I think a fan should at least give every book in the series a chance, you don’t have to force yourself to finish every book, but to crack them open, just give them a chance. Bc I think there’s something of value in every single one of them!
I’ve read them all and I gotta say that if you don’t take them too seriously, it’s worth the effort. But then, I am pretty forgiving and I can do headcanon gymnastics for fun to explain stuff I don’t like, or treat it as AU.
Originally, I was cutting canon off at TVA, but then, a fanfic came along that required Merrick to be canon,and I was pretty floored by the fic. Among other things, it opened up options for L/L that weren’t possible before.
The tricky thing, too, is that AR herself has said that she herself doesn’t think the hybrid Mayfair/VC novels “wore well over time,” so she disregards them and asks us to do so, as well. I know there are ppl who loved BF and BC, so hey, more power to them, but those events aren’t mentioned in PL/ROA so, you can disregard those books if you choose to do so.
In the most general way tho, just in my own headcanon, I accept everything except BF, BC, PL/ROA. Those 4 are AU fanfic to me, except for select elements.
So basically I look at all of canon as a buffet, and I pick and choose what I want to accept, bc even in the most weird/problematic/(or, what we used to call “cracky”) of the books, there are some good moments/lines that I enjoyed!
SINCE I was just discussing this w/ someone last night, and noticed I hadn’t mentioned it before… (and btw most of the above pics are from http://www.hansonhouse.com/taylor.htm)
Taylor Hanson from the 90′s is part of my headcanon for Lestat *u*
Yes, I know, he’s too old now. I KNOW. But one of my fave fic writers had used him as a face claim (they had cropped that first pic for their avatar) and the way they wrote him, the vulnerability, tenderness, the way he behaved, it was so perfectly meshed with how young Taylor looked and idk it just aligned perfectly for me. Lestat was only ~20 when he was turned ;A; and Taylor is like, right at that transition where the adult features are starting to take hold but the boyishness is still there, too. Taylor’s appearance is definitely in mind when I write my Lestat. I look at that first pic and I see a young man lost in his own music, drinking up the attention from the audience, loving the heat of the spotlights on him, his band supporting him, it’s just so touching and I love it.
Let me admit here that I liked MMMBop as a song! But was not a HANSON fan beyond that. The fact is that Taylor can/could sing, and play guitar, and looking the way he looked, I buy it.
Beauty is in the eye of the beholder so I’m not trying to sell this vision to anyone else, but I’m sharing it anyway bc thinking about it makes me happy ❤
I’m the way I always was about every new VC book: cautiously optimistic, there may be some great stuff in it, if not, it’s still going to be a Wild Ride as per usual!
Yes, you’re right, the descriptions are a little different, and idk who has control over that. I’m guessing it’s not the author *shrugs*
The U.S. description was more about Lestat still wrangling all the vampires into some kind of monarchy/democracy government and then:
… against his will, he must battle the menacing, seemingly unstoppable force determined to thwart his vision and destroy the entire vampire netherworld.
What now with this ‘unstoppable force’? I thought we already extracted Amel, he was specifically the ‘force’ pestering everybody and tryna start shit!
…and tells the riveting story of the formation of the Blood Communion and how he became Prince of the vampire world, the true ruler of this vast force,
What is ‘the Blood Communion’ is this going to be a blood orgy oh gawds… are all the vampires a ‘vast force’ now, or is he getting YET ANOTHER super power? Weather control and/or lightning, like Thor now?? *ragged sigh*
…and then of his fierce battle of wits and words with the mysterious Rhoshamandes…
Rhoshamandes, a force who refuses to live in harmony at the Court of Prince Lestat and threatens all that Lestat has dreamt of.
Ok, yes, a vampire civil war good BRING IT ON. Hopefully he gets some allies to even it up and make it a fair fight.
….As the tale unfolds, Lestat takes us from blah blah blah France to
blah blah blah
Louisiana
blah blah blah; from
blah blah
the Pacific’s untouched islands to the 18th-century city of St. Petersburg and the court of the Empress Catherine …”
^I’m guessing this last bit re: Empress Catherine will be us sitting down to hear more of Rhoshamandes’ story, we’ll see.
From blah blah blah France, Prince Lestat is grappling to instil a new ideology of peace and harmony among the blood-drinking community.
So no blood orgy mentioned ok, but…
Accustomed to welcoming all of the Undead – from far and wide – into his court, one night he awakes to news of a ruthless attack by a group of maverick blood-drinkers.
^THERE’S A GROUP OF THEM who attack. What would it take to attack a compound designed by vampires to be the safest place for them and teeming with vampires capable of telepathic gifts, a species that is always out for its own protection?
After fleeing to investigate the terror, Lestat learns of several new enemies who despise his rule over the blood-drinking realm, and who are intent on disrupting the harmony he tries so hard to maintain.
GOOD I’m glad the attackers have a group, it’s not just Everybody-Hates-Rhoshamandes on his own, that’d be kind of unfair.
One enemy in particular, the infamous Rhoshamandes, is notoriously powerful. But is Lestat strong enough to take on such evil alone or will sacrifices have to be made?
^SACRIFICES – makes me think a few of the old crew have been taken prisoner or have switched sides? IDK.
Then again, I do think there are enough new characters added in PL/ROA to be used specifically as canon fodder.
Will his cry for peace be heard in a world riddled with violence?
No. Honestly this is a pile of serial killers, murder is what they DO. And then, some ppl just want to watch the world burn, even if peace is offered and on the table.
An enthralling, sweeping adventure, full of drama and suspense, Blood Communion will have readers gripped to the very end. It is not just a compelling tale of a troubled leader, but a novel about the power of ambition, as well as a timely reflection on the struggle of individuals to find and defend their place in the world.
I think it is definitely timely, he is a troubled leader, and I think it’s got the potential to be very good the way Queen of the Damned was good.
I understand your confusion! To be honest, your message is extremely difficult to answer, there is plenty of evidence that they are not lovers, as you point out in your message: they “absolutely hate and insult each other” during IWTV (and in later books, too), and yes, Claudia tries to kill Lestat 😛 Those aren’t signs of love.
In my reading of canon, they do get together, but it is always a fragile “together.” They meet before Lestat’s concert, they are together at the end of QOTD, etc., there are many times in canon when they are physically together but, it is usually thick with the tension of whether it can last ;A; Perhaps that’s another reason why the L/L shippers make so many fanworks; we just don’t get enough L/L explicitly in canon.
When Anne Rice wrote IWTV, Lestat was clearly the main antagonist (other antagonists included Santiago, the theatre vampires, etc.). Lestat was intended to antagonize Louis. At the end of IWTV, one can say that Louis has won; even if he might not be all rainbows-and-sparkles-happy about life, Louis ends the book at least as a functionally independent vampire, whereas Lestat is miserable and broken, seemingly having difficulty even hunting for mortal victims on his own (dependent on a young “nurse vampire” bringing him a victim). There is disagreement between Lestat and Louis whether that scene even happened, but, whether it did or not, by the end of IWTV-era, it seems like Louis has overcome his abuser/monster and is the stronger one of the two of them.
Still, L/L did explicitly share some intimate moments in IWTV, when Lestat fed on Louis, and sharing the intimacy of the Dark Gift (the most intimate experience for vampires), and beyond than that, Lestat tells the reader in TVL to “Read between the lines.” A relationship does not need to be explicitly stated to exist, it is up to each individual reader to decide whether they want to ship those characters or not based on their reading of the story.
Personally, I ship
Louis/Lestat and thankfully, I have found plenty of other Louis/Lestat shippers in the fandom! Anyone is welcome to reblog/comment on this post as to why they ship Louis/Lestat ❤
TL:DR; Throughout canon Lestat pines for Louis QUITE A LOT. It is my personal belief that most of this pining is to “make up for” all the awful times during the years in IWTV when Lestat abused his fledglings, when they fought back, when Lestat was frustrated at being unable to give them the truth of their vampire nature by sharing his knowledge with them. To make up for the scenes that were not explicitly described in IWTV.
1) Here’s Lestat talking about Louis, from TVL:
I fell fatally in love with Louis, a young dark-haired bourgeois planter… Louis gained a hold over me far more powerful than Nicolas had ever had…
And why should I bother to tell of the times he came to me in wretched anxiety, begging me never to leave him, of the times we walked together and talked together, acted Shakespeare together for Claudia’s amusement, or went arm in arm to hunt the riverfront taverns or to waltz with the dark-skinned beauties of the celebrated quadroon balls?
^You could say he lied about any of this, we do have unreliable narrators. That’s up to you as a reader to decide if you believe Lestat’s account on this or not.
2) More of Lestat talking about Louis in TVL:
I kept glancing at him and away from him, as if his green eyes were hurting me. In modern parlance he was a laser beam. Deadly and delicate he seemed. His victims had always loved him.
And I had always loved him, hadn’t I, no matter what happened, and how strong could love grow if you had eternity to nourish it, and it took only these few moments in time to renew its momentum, its heat?
^This seems, again, to be very clearly stating that Lestat loves Louis. Whether that love is reciprocated is up to the reader’s interpretation.
3) In the immortal words of @high-fructose-lesbianism: “Now matter how hard you ship Louis and Lestat you will never ship Louis and Lestat as hard as Lestat does.” [X] Part of why it’s such a tough ship is that AR just does not let us have much in terms of explicit canon fluff of them! It mostly happens off-screen. Which is where fanworks steps in to satisfy that need ;] I have some more of this kind of thing mixed into my #nobody ships Louis and Lestat harder than Lestat ships Louis and Lestat tag.
“…but if I did have to choose, [my one companion for all eternity] would be Louis. My longest most enduring friendship and love affair in this world was with Louis. And though his limitations can be maddening, they can also be as inspiring to me as his virtues… the best choices we make are not always the wise choices. Sometimes they are intensely emotional choices. And I’ve always had a deep Romantic respect for emotion. My love for Louis transcends wisdom. And I may need the pain as much as the consolation that an eternal relationship with Louis would involve.“
6) Anne Rice gets this question on a regular basis. I don’t know if her answer below convinced the commenter, Romeo Naghdi, that Lestat is “totally bisexual, totally omni sexual” (which was another term for bisexual some years ago, IIRC). To be honest, I think when she answers these types of questions she is answering so that others can see her statement, even if the commenter might remain steadfast in their own opinion.
[^X 6/26/2015] ^Personally, I don’t know how Romeo Naghdi (and others who share his opinion) read the same books that I/we did, but I don’t care what he thinks of Lestat’s sexuality, and I would encourage you all to go with Anne Rice on this. She made her statement and then let it go.
I am not attempting to erase any queer representation in mentioning that we have these people who headcanon Lestat as straight. I included it only to give the context to AR’s comment.
I hope that helps, Anon! Again, anyone is welcome to reblog/comment on this as to why they ship Louis/Lestat, even though they “absolutely hate and insult each other” during IWTV!
I don’t know that he’s the best of any group, lol. I think he’s actually the worst among many. But, I do admire a lot of things about him. Sometimes we can’t help ourselves. As it was described to me once, falling for Lestat is like falling down a flight of stairs. Sometimes it happens and it’s not what you might have planned, and it’s not all rainbows and sparkles, it can be painful at times, lol. It is what it is. I should answer this more seriously but I can’t right now.
And do you know any good Lestat RP’s around here?
That’s really hard to answer bc:
A) I don’t follow as many RPers as I used to, there were too many threads on my dash and I couldn’t read them all.
B) I try not to pick out names bc that can make people feel left out.
C) My taste in an RPer is subjective, I don’t think it’s fair for me to say who’s good or not, I could never be objective about people RPing as the characters they love, doing it for free, for fun, on their own time!
^All that said, if you’re looking for a Lestat to RP with there are a pile of them out there at any given time, but whether they’re active or welcome new RP partners is up to each one individually. Most Lestats are happy to respond to Asks tho! (My Lestat will respond to asks, but will not do back and forth threads, the mun doesn’t have the time for that.)
Here are some Lestats I’ve seen around (in no particular order):
As @shippingisnotactivism put it so succinctly: Often times people aren’t actually interested in a debate, they are interested in making you do intellectual/emotional labour for no reason at all. [X]
I wrote this huge Wall of Text despite the above quote. If you’re a sealion, Anon, you’ve accomplished your mission to some extent, you’ve managed to get me to spend more time and effort on this response than I ever wanted to.
I didn’t write it for you, though. I wrote it for my 15 year old self who was able to read and enjoy all the fictional problematic content I wanted. My 15 year old self loved black comedy, dark humor. I was never criticized for it. I was bullied for other things, like my wonky teeth, my hair style, my (lack of) fashion sense, which, looking at pics of myself, I can see why I was an easy target!
Now, we have bullies who do it in a much more insidious way. They tell you that your interest in problematic content means that you endorse it in real life. I’d rather be bullied for my teeth again.
I actually did spend time crowdsourcing privately to respond to this ask, I got some good answers, but you know what? I don’t need to write a full dissertation on horror/gothic lit and/or Marius/Armand’s relationship and/or Ricean vampire sex/intimacy and/or Anne Rice’s motivations for writing what she writes and/or VC fandom’s reactions to VC ships, etc., for an anonymous person(s) on the internet. You said you’ve seen posts about it already. Being in the middle is an acceptable place to be. I’m not here to force you to one side or the other.
You’re looking for easy answers to complicated questions. It’s not my responsibility to feed you those answers. And I would hope that you would take anyone else’s response to your questions with a grain of salt, and not simply accept opinions as truth because they sound good and righteous.
These are issues with so much nuance, so many facets, and to write Marius/Armand off as simply “abusive” and “pedophilia” is extremely narrow-minded to me. To write off people who attempt to discuss these things in fiction as “abuse-apologists” and “pedophilia-apologists” is a form of bullying. If we cannot discuss problematic things in fiction in a civilized way, it won’t make these things A) disappear from fiction or B) stop happening in real life.
If you’ve been watching/following my blog for even a few weeks, or you check out my archive, you know that I’ve reblogged plenty of Marius/Armand fanart, some of it NSFW. So I think you can do the math on what my stance is on that.
I confess that I was never wildly into that ship, but I have always loved talent and skill in the fanart/fanfic of both of these characters, separately and together, and now my interest in it is A) to have some variety in my blog rather than always reblogging fanworks about L/L (my main ship and, arguably, the VC juggernaut ship), and B) to support anyone who loves those characters separately or ships them together, and let them know that I support them. They can like whatever fictional content they like.
There is no debate when it comes to my own permission to like whatever I like in fiction, and I extend that permission to everyone. It’s fictional. Period.
^Marge Simpson is against pro wrestling here. It was an actual debate, you can google it. I’m not interested in arguing with her. I’m not even interested in calling her “a Killjoy,” even though she’s asked the viewer to do so. Unlike Marge, I’m not interested in forcing anyone to agree with any of my opinions.
More importantly, why is she standing up there next to the TV? She wants to divert attention from it and onto herself. Marge wants the attention.
She is riding on it as a topic, and it’s an easy target, bc it is VIOLENCE. Scripted or not, we all generally agree that violence is bad. So she stands there concerned, but does she really think it’s so awful? I don’t remember the episode well enough to know if she says that pro wrestling is definitively a bad influence on its viewers. Her caption says enough: “BC THIS IS NOT TO MY TASTE, NO ONE ELSE SHOULD BE ABLE TO ENJOY IT.”
Would she take into account that it’s cathartic for fans of pro wrestling to watch the scripted violence played out? Would she care that we love rooting for our faves and we love watching them appear to beat the crap out of the other wrestlers for dominance? Would she care that we can watch it and know the difference between violence in media and in real life? I’m thinking that if she is truly committed to her crusade against violence in pro wrestling, she would be unable to cede an inch of ground, even a molecule of nuance could topple her from her soapbox. Acknowledging that her opinion is opinion and not fact would be acknowledging that she could be wrong, and that’s unacceptable to Marge.
It’s not enough for Marge to respect the old fandom rule of #Don’t Like, Don’t Read. When there is something as juicy as a topic with a buzzword that invokes an immediate reaction to get righteous about, the argument becomes: #I Don’t Like This Thing; No One Should Read/Write This Thing (Unless they Write it the Way I Want it Written).
The points I would make, if I were making points, would be these, listed below. You can do your own further research, bc I’m not being paid for this, and have no obligation to provide sources that will most likely fall on the deaf ears of the “Marges” of fandom who are unable to cede any ground. I am not obligated to respond to arguments against this post.
These points are for the Marius/Armand shippers and Marius fans to show my support for them by sharing some of my own thoughts.
“Vampires operate on a different moral code than human beings.” Anon, you wrote this yourself, and I think it’s a good point. An essay could be written on it.
^Some of the vampires may want to abide by human moral codes, but thosemay be codes from the era they were turned. I wouldn’t even say that moral codes have evolved, I would say that moral codes are on a pendulum swinging from moral to immoral, back and forth.
^Attitudes towards sex/intimacy also change during different eras. This includes the time periods during which the novels were written, what was expected in fiction then, what the cultural landscape was like, etc.
The ship itself occurred during a time period in history when underage/adult relationships mlm were socially acceptable. You can argue that she should not have chosen that time period, but she’s a writer, she can choose whatever time period she wants.
Given the content, I would suggest that these books were written for adults who know the difference between fiction and reality.
These books are fiction, they are not self-help manuals.
^If you use them as a self-help manual and are harmed, it is your misuse of them, not the author’s fault, and not the books’ fault. Like alcoholism. It’s not the alcohol’s fault if you drink it irresponsibly.
Shipping is not just for wish fulfillment/idealization, but it can be. Maybe Marius/Armand is wish fulfillment/idealization for Anne Rice.
^While it is a possibility, I highly doubt she’s intentionally trying to injure any of her readers, especially if she sees
Marius/Armand
and Marius himself as good and desirable.
I absolutely do not condone pedophilia, abuse, or grooming in real life, and in my 20+ years of fandom I have never met a Marius/Armand shipper or Marius fan who condones any of those things in real life, either.
I do not believe that an author is required to condemn problematic elements within the text.
^Which she definitely wouldn’t do anyway, if she sees Marius/Armand and Marius himself as good and desirable.
Anne Rice has similar ships with the underage/adult dynamic that don’t get the hate Marius/Armand does, oddly enough. Furthermore, she didn’t invent it, this is a fantasy that’s been around since before she was even born.
There are a bunch of other kinks mixed into that ship that I don’t need to list out here for you. Anne Rice/the fans/anyone is allowed to have/explore their kinks in fiction or in consensual spaces online/in real life with other adults.
It is my belief that underage people (including Anne Rice) can be curious about sex/intimacy before reaching the Age of Consent.
^Are we only allowed to be curious about it on the stroke of the first minute of our 18th birthday?? I believe Anne writes these ships setting herself as the underage character, spending decades rebelling against what she perceived was an overly repressive religious upbringing in which the adults in her life tried to convince her that her curiosity was EVIL and a disgusting form of Sinning. Making it the “forbidden fruit” just made it that much more desirable for underage!Anne. IMO, her underage/adult ships are a coping mechanism she does for her younger self.
I am not knowledgeable enough about horror/gothic lit to say how Marius/Armand compares to other ships in those stories, but as I understand it, the exploration of monsters of all kinds has been problematic since monster stories were invented.
^Horror/goth lit elevated these stories to a higher intellectual level, so they were criticized on a higher intellectual level than the older monster stories. However, the criticism of exploring these concepts has always been harsher to women writers bc PATRIARCHY and how dare women explore sexual fantasies without permission?!
Shippers of Marius/Armand are easy targets for bullying and harassment as that ship and character tick off plenty of boxes of things we know are wrong in real life.But as I’ve said in the past, creating/consuming problematic things =/= endorsement of them in real life. Thoughtcrimes are not crimes.
It’s easier to attack
Marius/Armand
shippers and Marius fans than attempting to attack Anne Rice. Anne Rice is a published author, insulated from anything she doesn’t want to hear/read. The shippers, like me, are humans behind their screens, and we all just want to get along with each other, so getting accused of endorsing real life problematic things bc of their ship preference is something shippers are very likely to respond to. Shipper attention, while not as juicy as attention from Anne Rice herself, is a reasonable substitute for the “Marges” feed on.
Ultimately I am a #Ship and let ship person and I support the shippers of problematic fictional ships and the fans of problematic fictional characters.
One of the great things about fiction is that we can revisit how we feel about characters at different points in our lives. I know I felt differently about Claudia as I got older. I think I had an idea of what she felt when I first read IWTV, but as an adult I can better understand how devastating it must have been for her, and how frustrating for her ‘parents’ who were unable to help guide her in any significant way re: the fact that she would never physically age ;A;
With Daniel, I admit he’s not one of the characters I engaged with as much as others, so I can’t really speak specifically to your comments about him. You may change your opinion again as you get older, too. I always liked that he seemed to fly by the seat of his pants, and was ballsy enough to just keep asking for what he wanted, knowing Armand wouldn’t give it to him. That even in his darkest moments, he demonstrated an inquisitive nature, and was obviously capable of giving/receiving love. That’s inspiring, at least to me.
He’s one of the first VC characters (Jesse is another one) who we get to spend significant time with in canon as a mortal, and get an idea about what it’s like to get involved with vampires; it can’t be easy to just sit down and be quiet when you have one of these supernatural beings fixated on you!
I mean, you can google these terms yourself, too, why are you coming to me (or that anon)?
I can only guess. Maybe it’s bc (A) you’re genuinely curious and you enjoy the way I answer things (whether you agree with me or not isn’t relevant), or (B) you’re looking to stir some shit bc that’s what this site does best, exacerbate disagreement bc ACTIVISM.
I didn’t invent these words and have no need to defend them, you’re forcing me to make a post that could easily offend Europeans or people who identify as fops, and/or both. I’m not interested in making potential Offense Fodder.
There was a time in fandom that I could just take this at face value and assume that you’re genuinely curious and you enjoy the way I answer things, so that’s how I’m responding, since I’m not interested in making potential Offense Fodder.
A Eurotrash Fop might look like this:
[X] OP @alternativepurple tagged it as: #fashion #rococo #artistic #gentleman #retro #make-up #makeup #make up #aristocrat #elegant aristocrat
^These are positive tags, I’d say, and I’d agree. There are more positive tags in reblogs of that post, like “#inspiration”. But there is also definitely a poking-fun-at about this, this model is so heavily slathered in makeup that the powder has fallen on their clothing and hair ribbon too, the blush is unnaturally red on their cheekbone and it’s even purposefully on their chin, they have so much lace on that it might get in the way of using their gloved hand in some way. It’s intentionally overdone, and I think it’s gorgeous in it’s overdoneness.
In context, I think the Anon you refer to meant “Eurotrash fop” in gentle mockery: “and we need diversity in an ocean of white Eurotrash fops!” There’s a sense of humor there in the image of a literal ocean of heavily made-up people, all jostling together in their fancy clothes.
^This is a crowd pic from the Shining which I brightened up to make it more of an ocean of fancy-dressed white people, which is what Anon was basically talking about. I think in the Shining it was mocking the crowd as an ocean of faces, too, that Jack Torrance had been swallowed by the Overlook and blends in
A human sub-phylum characterized by its apparent affluence, worldliness, social affectation and addiction to fashion. Males are characterized by a semi-slovenly appearance (including half-shaven faces), greasy hair, rib-hugging shirts, tight jeans and loafers worn without socks. Women are easily distinguished by anorexia, over-bleached hair, gaudy jewelry, plastic surgery (particularly breast-enlargement) and their attachment to the male species. Both sexes greet each other with “air kisses,” immediately speak of their last trip (often Paris, Rome, Majorca), spend hours at “see-and-be-seen” restaurants and exhibit a world-weariness and pained sense of irony.
^Sounds about right as far as I know the word, although harsher in judgement than actual living people I’ve known who shamelessly self-identified as Eurotrash.
Fop became a pejorative term for a foolish man excessively concerned with his appearance and clothes in 17th-century England. Some of the very many similar alternative terms are coxcomb,[1] fribble, popinjay (meaning ‘parrot’), fashion-monger, and ninny. Macaroni was another term, of the 18th century, more specifically concerned with fashion.
A modern-day fop may also be a reference to a foolish person who is excessively concerned about his clothing, luxuries, minor details, refined language and leisurely hobbies. He is generally incapable of engaging in conversations, activities or thoughts without the idealism of aesthetics or pleasures.
^Both of those words sound like they could apply to many of the VC characters.
I’ll repeat myself: When we joke about characters, that’s not to say that that’s always a negative act. Look, we’re currently dragging Lestat bc he said IN CANON that he loved being called a “slut,” which is really more of a layered commentary on shaming people for enjoying sex/intimacy, and he refuses to be shamed for it, he’ll turn around and take it as a compliment instead 😉 Same goes for calling him a “Eurotrash fop.” It’s teasing. It’s intended to amuse. It falls under Dark Humor or Black Comedy. If that’s not your thing, that’s fine, but it is a thing, and I like that thing.
A form of humor involving a twist or joke making the joke seen as offensive, harsh, horrid. Yet the joke is still funny. You need to have pension for dark humor in order to find it truly funny. In a way, it could be seen as the jokes are so horrible in their twist that it makes it funny.
Black comedy,also known as dark comedy or gallows humor,is a comic style that makes light of subject matter that is generally considered taboo, particularly subjects that are normally considered serious or painful to discuss such as death. Some comedians use it as a tool for exploring vulgar issues, thus provoking discomfort and serious thought as well as amusement in their audience. Popular themes of the genre include violence (murder, abuse, domestic violence, rape, torture, war, genocide, terrorism, corruption), discrimination (chauvinism, racism, sexism, homophobia, transphobia), disease (anxiety, depression, suicide, nightmares, drug abuse, mutilation, disability, terminal illness, insanity), sexuality (sodomy, homosexuality, incest, infidelity, fornication), religion and barbarism.
I-want-my-IWTV 