People seem to think that because my intelligence is functional, because I can live independently, drive, etc., that I don't struggle with any of it. They discount my chronic overwhelm at work as "needing to accept that every job is like this" even though that means I'll fail at every job since... I'm good at the one thing that's my job title and garbage at the extra responsibilities they pile on and on. I tell 'em my lived experience of people othering me, harassing me, performing weird-ass social experiments to see the retarded kid's reaction, and they goad me into cognitive exercises where I'm meant to convince myself that no one actually has a problem with me even though I still get funny looks just because of the way I walk. And so on for every aspect of life that I struggle with. LMAO. Like, I get it. It's weird and oddly specific and near impossible to understand wtf I'm talking about without experiencing it, but that's how it is, bro. So because of that, actual improvement feels impossible?

I thought the show adaptation would be cringe since they changed the time period to be more recent, but it's still pretty engrossing! Even the race changing stuff was in line with the books. Besides the lack of creativity and the lazy fake-wokeness of it, I don't care that much when a character's race is changed in fiction, but in IWTV it was so goooooodddddd. Ughhhhh. Louis self-describes as a "creole" in the books, so it stands to reaosn that he's mixed. Same with Claudia considering the New Orleans setting, & them being the same race only adds to their bond. It's as much a "two people oppressed by a crazed Frenchman who grew up with peak privilege and a coloniser mindset" as it is "spouse and child, victims of a shared abuser." I loveeee an interpretation that's backed by the text.

And MY GOD does Sam Reid make a terrifying Lestat. I love how they depicted the abuse as a whole, really - authors like Anne Rice and Donna Tartt are such talents at writing viscious, cruel, hateful, self-obsessed, mad, mad, mad abusers that I'm convinced they've experienced it themselves. Translates so well into live action.

Lestat is one of those beautiful-terrible characters that I'm glad exists. If I had read this series when I was younger, I would have felt salvaged. I might have even recognised him in the people around me. He keeps Louis in this really stressful amniotic suspension between "we're fated for each other" and "we immortals can do anything we want ;)" and in the end it just boils down to... none of that. The rules keep changing. Your abuser is the one who decides what's allowed, and if you don't understand, if you find it unfair, if you want honesty, communication, just a little bit of an explanation as to why they act the way they do (not even a justification! just a "here's why!"), you are the problem. You don't understand. You don't love them, because love is surrender.