#aka: genuinely sometimes I think I live in a parallel universe and simply watched/read different things

[bereft-of-frogs]

There’s that post that’s like ‘everyone should get into a tiny niche fandom at least once’ fully agree, that was really fun -- but I would like to add that everyone should get into a fandom where their opinions run counter to major fanon because it really teaches you about sticking to your guns and trusting your interpretation of the text without having to rely on peer validation

because WHAT are people talking about sometimes

#aka: genuinely sometimes I think I live in a parallel universe and simply watched/read different things #full disclosure it does make you feel like a killjoy sometimes #because often times these fanons will be presented in a silly jokey manner #'oh so silly isn't this character so funny this is just my silly little headcanon' #and it's like yes yes lol lol but ok look me in the eyes and tell me you know that this is #at best only one interpretation of many and at worst simply not supported by the text at all #please tell me you know that #or in one specific example such a ubiquitous joke that is literally a significant theme of the work and i feel like SUCH a killjoy #being like 'ok yes very funny.....you know that was a major theme right?? tell me you know that'

[nandoor]

guillermo & why he wants to be a vampire (aka a long rambling meta post): 

tw for mention of suicide/suicidal ideation 

i’ve got 3 ideas rolling around in my head but tbh i think aspects of all 3 ideas are valid/plausible given what we know of guillermo so far

1) unhappiness as a human: 

it’s very clear that guillermo did not have the easiest childhood. he makes numerous references to being bullied growing up & even his mannerisms, the way he dresses, & his way of speaking suggest years of verbal & physical abuse for being who he is. 

whether vampirism will actually make him happier (which, honestly, it might--i mean he has devoted over a decade of his life at this point so guillermo is, at the very least, convinced this is 100% what he wants) is debatable, but it would be a considerably different life for him & that may be enough. 

i think it’s fair to say that up until finding out vampires were real and that he could potentially become a vampire if he acted as a vampire’s familiar, guillermo was likely depressed & unhappy with life. frankly, i can’t imagine a human wanting to be a vampire unless they were terribly bored or upset w/ their current lot in life. 

2) vampirism as a metaphor and/or substitute for suicide--aka does guillermo actually want to be a vampire?: 

this ties in w/ option #1 but the difference here is that guillermo seeking out a vampire to turn him was, ultimately, a substitute for suicide. 

suicidal ideation isn’t always big, grand dangerous gestures. maybe you don’t wear a seatbelt on purpose when driving or you don’t pay attention when crossing the street in heavy traffic or you encourage/build bad habits (i.e., excessive drinking, smoking, drug abuse, and/or other unsafe practices). & purposefully searching for vampires seems like a wwdits universe equivalent at the very least given the inherent danger involved. 

in this way, you can see guillermo’s desire to be a vampire less of an ambition & more of a desperate attempt for something that will make him happy--or, specifically, a way to regain control of a life he no longer feels is worth living. furthermore, even the act of being a familiar is dangerous & almost an admission of a death wish--guillermo had seen countless of familiars employed to nadja & laszlo die, but he never stopped being nandor’s familiar despite facing death on numerous occasions. 

at the end of the day, in the wwdits universe, becoming a vampire requires you to die. if you want to become a vampire, you are embracing the idea of dying. your heart stops. your brain ceases to function. your soul leaves your body and the ghost of your human self drifts off into the land of the dead. & when you wake as a vampire, you will have more in common with a corpse than with a living, breathing human. you subsist on the literal lifeblood of others much like a ghost might need an object to haunt/possess to remain in the living world. 

take for instance laszlo--some of his dialogue reveals that he was quite unhappy as a human & also was likely destined to die sometime soon (from the plague). once nadja turns him into a vampire, however, he is unbelievably happy. he loves & cares for nadja deeply--he feels no resentment towards her for his turning even if it wasn’t necessarily consensual at the time. &, unlike nandor & nadja, who seemingly wax poetic about their ‘human’ days (most likely bc they were both turned against their will/were not actually unhappy w/ their human lives), laszlo seems to care very little about talking about his human life. his real ‘life’ began the moment he met nadja, plain & simple. 

which brings us back to guillermo. if being a vampire hunter can give him the autonomy, power, and community he craved in his original pursuit to become a vampire, than i honestly don’t think guillermo will want to be a vampire anymore. because it wasn’t about being a vampire--it was about finding something to live for. of course i personally think that we don’t need to find something to live for--rather, we should learn to just live for ourselves if possible but i digress.

3) the happiest option: he genuinely loves vampires/vampire culture (?): 

not much to say here other than guillermo is in it for the #aesthetic. or, rather, he was in it for the aesthetic at first but i doubt something as vapid as simply enjoying the /idea/ of vampires would keep anyone in the role of familiar for over 10 yrs. he also probably clung to the idea that being a vampire would fix all his ‘human’ problems, make his lifelong self-esteem issues & desire for community disappear if he was able to successfully integrate himself in a group that would accept him for who he was, eccentricities and all. he wants to be his 100% authentic self & vampires are a group that will pretty much welcome anyone into their fold (ex: we’ve got jenna, who parallels guillermo pretty well, & was accepted by nadja & eventually laszlo w/ open arms as she was. like nadja didn’t make her change or doll her up or anything like that--jenna is still the same jenna from before she grew fangs... just w/ a severe sun allergy & a strictly liquid diet lmao) 

+ bonus crack idea: guillermo’s obsession w/ vamps is actually a byproduct of his van helsing heritage. i love the idea that his wires got super crossed thanks to watching iwtv/reading anne rice novels as a kid & instead of feeling disgust or hatred for vamps, he falls head over heels w/ them as a metaphor for the ‘otherness’ that he felt growing up (assumedly as a gay POC in a strict catholic household). 

like just imagine abraham van helsing’s ghost rolling in his grave over the fact that one of his strongest descendants is actually hopelessly in love with a vampire a vampire’s familiar. 

van helsing: ok so this is all a plot to kill the vampires once you’ve gained their trust, yes? 

van helsing 10+ yrs later: ...you’ve got to be kidding me :/

#wwdits #what we do in the shadows #tw suicide mention #guillermo de la cruz #wwdits meta