rhodrymavelyne

You know you’re utterly obsessed with Hannibal the TV series when you visualize a crossover between it and the musical Into the Woods. Or perhaps I should say I know I am.

It started with a cackle. Raúl Esparza’s cackle during the Hannibal Season 3 gag reel amidst the intense scene where Will Graham faces Dr. Chilton after Frederick’s disturbing ‘date’ with the Great Red Dragon, a date which left him burned, lipless, and looking hag-like. Raúl Esparza started cackling like a melodramatic hag in a fairy tale, making both Hugh Dancy and Lawrence Fishburne bust up themselves.

I found myself thinking of Bernadette Peters’s performance as the witch in Into the Woods, how she’d cackled at the baker and his wife when she revealed that she’d cursed the baker, right after her “Greens, greens, and nothing but greens!” rant. All of a sudden I saw Dr. Chilton, still hideously burned, striding into the F.B.I. lab in his double-breased suit, carrying a silver-skull headed cane with a leather leash attached to it. The leash is connected to a spiked collar around the neck of Francis Dolarhyde who looks like a zombie bondage boy. By zombie bondage boy, I mean that the Great Red Dragon is wearing nothing but that collar, a leather thong, and a matching gag. Scars where Hannibal Lecter and Will Graham cut and tore him stand out in livid relief upon his dead-pale skin. He’s doing a zombie shuffle walk, which becomes a zombie shuffle dance when Chilton launches into a long rant of exposition, pantomiming the doctor’s story, mocking it in a submissive fashion. And Chilton does rant, launching into his own rendition of the witch’s story, “Beets, beets, and nothing but beets!” pointing an accusing finger at Jimmy Price. It appears that Jimmy’s mysterious twin stole the beets from Dr. Chilton’s garden. Dr. Chilton responded with a curse, err, analysis which affects Jimmy Price and Brian Zeller as well as Jimmy’s brother. Their parts on Hannibal will always be small ones, although he’s willing to reverse his curse if they do as he asks.

The absurd doesn’t stop there. I imagined Hannibal in all his elegance singing Agony in a duet with Jack Crawford as Hannibal serves up Abel Gideon to an oblivious Jack. They don’t even notice poor Abel is there, even though they’re eating him. They’re too busy singing about Will, what an elusive puzzle he is, how frustrating it can be, trying to guide him. Yes, Will Graham plays the part of two of the heroines from Into the Woods. He’s both Cinderella, able to summon dogs instead of birds, and Rapunzel, kept under lock and key by the witch, i.e. Dr. Chilton. Yes, time has become messed up for why else would a zombie version of the Great Red Dragon be around? To make matters weirder, Will is part of a bizarre family unit in prison involving Abel Gideon and the devoted nurse who was willing to kill for Will as his ‘stepsisters’. Will wants to escape from the asylum, to try to catch the Chesapeake Ripper, to regain Jack Crawford’s trust, only a part of his mind warns him all is not right, reality is not what it should be, and is longing to find Hannibal Lecter for more complicated reasons than that. Dr. Gideon and the nurse are quite starry-eyed over the Chesapeake Ripper (until poor Abel gets eaten), the icon of all serial killers whom see their work as art. They admire or envy Will for the special attention Will has gotten from the Ripper, even if it’s being framed and imprisoned. I pictured Will and Abel singing a weird version of “He’s a very nice prince” together; “But how can you know what you want if you don’t know who you are?”/“If you can’t be who you are, what’s the point in wishing?”

No, this isn’t the end to the strange. I pictured Miriam Lass as Little Red Riding Hood on a mission for Jack Crawford, only her path crosses Hannibal Lecter’s when he’s being a wolf, not a prince. She later warns Will Graham, “Do not put your faith in a badge and a gun/They will not protect you the way that they should.” Maybe that warning should be a duet with Beverly Katz. I also imagined Abigail Hobbs and her father, Garrett Jacob Hobbs taking the place of Jack and his mother. Instead of a cow called Milky-White, they are living with a Grim Reaper called Georgia Mâdchen/George Lass. Yes, a Dead Like Me crossover snuck into this. Their problem isn’t poverty, but the fact that they’re dead and can’t cross over. They’re stuck haunting Will Graham. Garrett Jacob Hobbs is certain this is happening because Abigail insists on maintaining a friendship with a Grim Reaper. Maybe this is partially his fault because he killed all the girls who could have been her friends. They have to do something about this Reaper, get her to leave, to go bother someone else, so father and daughter can move on. Amidst all this, Freddie Lounds acts as the narrator, coming up to the various characters, trying to interview them, only to be chased off by Dr. Alana Bloom and Margo Verger.

This is it, the crazy flight of fanciful fandom my imagination took me on. I’m not sure if I’ll actually turn this into a fanfiction story or not, it seems so whacked. At the same time, it’s fun whack, it’s not all whack, and it’s an idea that’s been stewing for months now. Whether or not to prepare this stew and share it with others would require filling the holes in this story which continue to gape. It’s still cooking in the pot, so to speak.

Brian Fuller referred to Hannibal as elegant horror. All of the artist flourishs from the beauty of nightmarish objects to the bella figura Hannibal himself cuts walking through a palazzo in his Italian suit add to the elegance.

Watching this show has brought back memories of another example of elegant horror, one I fell in love with when I was very young. The monsters cut a dashing figure across the moonlight, savouring the taste of blood, even as they felt the value of the human they drained. Hannibal makes me think of Anne Rice’s Vampire Chronicles, not the least for the tender, intimate moments which happen between two men amidst the horror. These moments meant as much to me as that horror, making the horror all the richer for their dramatic pauses, transforming it into art.

It’s hard to analyze this transformation. It’s so easy to simply to let myself be swept away by it, whirling my imagination around and around like the dominant partner in a dance, carrying my thoughts away in a rush, leaving me too giddy with the sensations to truly study them.

I want to do this myself, though. I want to create such elegance. My work is nowhere near as dark as Hannibal. I’m not sure if it’s as dark as Anne Rice’s, although Tales of the Navel: The Shadow Forest comes close. I want the Gardens of Arachne to be a place of elegant horror. I’m hoping to bring a touch of it to Omphalos. Fairy tales can be vehicles for elegant horror and I try to carry fairy tale magic to all of my stories.

The trappings of civilized, polished society can be a mask for something else which means to hunt, stalk, and bring danger into the heart of civilization. Crafting my own masks for my own characters is an art form I hope to polish, while I introduce them to stories. Creating my own mixtures of elegant horror is something I intend to explore, even if at times, I only add a dash, and at others, I mix in a generous portion.

Wish me luck.

I know I’m completely obsessed with Seraph of the End when I read a historical account of Edward II and his cousin, Thomas of Lancaster and find myself comparing them to Krul Tepes and Ferid Bathory. This is not Thomas B. Costain’s fault, but his book, The Three Edwards brought back a lot of memories of Chris Hunt’s historical novel, Gaveston. I often wondered if Hunt used Costain’s book as a reference material. He came up with a very interesting explaination for why Edward disliked his cousin so much. When they were young, Thomas tried several times to force himself upon Edward, professing to be utterly smitten with the prince’s beauty, to have fallen madly in love with him. Lancaster’s true love, however, was power. His lustful eye never left the throne of England, even while it was fixated upon his cousin’s golden beauty.

This made me think of Ferid’s professions of devotion for Krul Tepes, the vampire queen. Ferid claims to be smitten with her, yet what he truly lusts for is Krul’s power. Both Lancaster and Ferid are taken with their sovereign’s beauty, yet questioning that sovereign’s place on the throne, challenging their sovereign’s power. Both Edward II and Krul taunt and look down their noses at this ambitious suitor, spurning them for a favourite.

In Edward’s situation, the favourite is Piers Gaveston. In Krul’s, it’s Hyakuya Mikaela. Both Edward and Krul invest quite a bit of power and attention in this favourite, sparking off jealousy in their other subjects.

Another curious parallel is the spurned suitor torments, yet fancies the favourite. Lancaster confesses that he always wanted Gaveston and Ferid makes no secret of his desire for Mika. One might argue that favourite was both Edward and Lancaster’s downfall in Gaveston. Was Mika Krul’s? Will he become Ferid’s as well? Mika did distract Krul at the crucial moment which both Crowley and Ferid took advantage of.

It will be interesting to see how far this parallel will play out. It’s not a perfect one. For instance, there’s an important emotional element to the equation in Seraph of the End, Hyakuya Yuichirou. After all Yu is Mika’s major motivation while Gaveston’s is more enigmatic. One might argue the latter’s actions were dictacted by glory and pride. Everything he obtained was to bolster up both, whether it was lands, titles, or favours from his adoring king.

This is the motivation Thomas B. Costain gives Piers Gaveston in The Three Edwards, but is that his only one? Much as I enjoy Costain’s writing, he plays favourites and Gaveston isn’t one of them, even when he’s trying to be fair. At the same time, he has little good to say of Thomas of Lancaster other than he was a dangerous man to cross. Nothing Costain writes contradicts the dark picture Chris Hunt painted of him. It’s a contradictory love Lancaster expressed for his prince, which has me drawing this parallel between him and Ferid Bathory.

Where does lust for their monarch’s beautiful person end and lust for their powers and possessions begin? It’s a complex relationship and array of desires, caught up in the hierarchy of their respective societies.

I also marvel at the parallels which occur to me when I’m obsessed, yet I think both Hunt and Kaguya-sensei struck on a common theme of the lust for power being bound up with the person in power. Certain themes recurr again and again across genre and in different themes of story.

It never fails to fascinate me when one catches my eye.

Every time I read something again, I pick up something new.

Tokyo Babylon remains my favorite manga after over ten years. I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve read it, mulled over its scenes, contemplated fanon involving these characters or interpreted canon.

Now I’m seeing a parallel between the woman who punishes her baby and the last story and Hokuto. Or perhaps I should say Subaru’s perception of Hokuto.

Subaru saw his twin dying in his place at the sakurazukamori’s hands, a fate he was resigned to. Perhaps he felt he deserved to be punished to loving a man like Seishirou, only he’s denied that punishment by Hokuto sacrificing herself.

The woman hits her baby because it’s like hitting herself. She failed to retain her husband’s love. She didn’t stop him from running off with another woman. She can’t herself, but she hits the child, whom she considers part of herself.

Subaru failed to win the bet, to change Seishirou. Hokuto died because of that failure, but she also left her twin behind by dying in Subaru’s place. It’s too late to yell at her, to cry at her not to go. He can only make himself suffer, living on as she wished, living on as she never would have wished.

In a way, it’s the ultimate revenge, a punishment as bad as Subaru could ever deliver to his sister for sacrificing herself to Seishirou, for stealing his sacrifice. Only is he really lashing out at Hokuto? Or is he seeing her as part of himself and lashing out at that?

The little girl, however, points out something Subaru had forgotten, something Hokuto herself would have reminded him of, if she were still alive. The baby isn’t his mother. He’s his own person.

Hokuto isn’t, wasn’t Subaru. She made her own choices. She decided to face Seishirou, to sacrifice herself in Subaru’s place. Subaru couldn’t have altered that decision, not in the state he was in. If he could go back in time, change things, maybe he could have. Punishing himself now, though, won’t change Subaru or Hokuto’s choices now. Hokuto and Seishirou won’t come back. All Subaru is doing is hurting himself.

Perhaps he does realize that at the end of the story. Perhaps this is where his dangerous, destructive wish begins, a wish that changed his resolve to kill Seishirou into something else. As painful as it might be to his grandmother or Hokuto, as imcomprehensible as it might be to Seishirou, Subaru starts thinking about what he, Subaru wants. There’s something dignified in the tragedy of this resolution, an assertion of the self, even though it may end in the annihilation of the self.

This is something CLAMP shows again and again in their stories, the value of an individual wish. It also shows how much our wishes can hurt other people.

Subaru is perhaps one of the most tragic characters CLAMP has ever created, because while he’s inclined to be kind to others, he’s also makes destructive choices for himself. Without Seishirou swooping into destroy the perils that menace him, or Hokuto kicking him into look after himself, Subaru isn’t going to bother.

It’s his choice, though, and there’s no one to stop him from making it. Or is there?

Perhaps the tragic events to come in X 1999 was Seishirou stepping in one last time to save Subaru from himself. For all his protestations of not caring, the sakurazukamori did that.

This is one of the reasons this manga stands out so strikingly among others. It gives a reader a lot to think about what truly makes a person happy, and the consequences of our choices. It explores them in a depth I find fascinating.

Perhaps this is why Tokyo Babylon remains my favourite manga.

I became more aware of this conflict when I was reading Jason Aaron’s beautiful and well-written Star Wars comics. These graphic novels take place during the time period between Star Wars: A New Hope and The Empire Strikes Back. They showed some of the adventures Luke Skywalker, Princess Leia Organa, Han Solo, Chewbacca, Artoo Detoo, See Threepio as well as their enemy, Darth Vader had during after the destruction of the first Death Star.

Vader’s growing obsession with Luke and acquiring the means to pursue it was beautifully developed within these books. A major part of this obsession is the Sith Lord's realization that Luke Skywalker is Obi-Wan’s last hope and what he died for. Acknowledging that hope is accompanied by a determination that this untrained youth is going to be his weapon, not his former Master’s. Determination becomes obsession when Vader discovers that Luke is his long lost son, whom Obi-Wan successfully hid from him for years.

The fact that Obi-Wan managed to conceal Luke infuriates Vader. Realization that the Emperor told him Padme died in childbirth cracks his loyalty to his new master and kindles a new goal, to kill Palpatine and take the Empire from him. The only person Vader wants or needs at his side is his son. Luke becomes the prize in the silent dialogue Vader has with his old master when Vader retraces Luke’s steps and searches for him, for the past Obi-Wan was a part of and he was not. It’s an intense conflict, a deeply personal one which Vader shares with no one, even as it intersects with Luke’s own quest to find a teacher, anything that’s left of the Jedi, to become what Obi-Wan wished him to. The dark side and light of the Force are pitted together through its agents as they both strive to guide this young man toward his destiny.

It’s a fascinating struggle and brings back memories of another mentorship rivalry which was quite intense in the X-Men comics between Emma Frost and Ororo/Storm. No hint of any romance between Scott Summers and White Queen existed at the time. Emma was every inch the White Queen, devoted to acquiring and training young mutants to serve the Hellfire Club. Storm was a member of the X-Men and would later become their leader. The two of them encountered Kitty Pryde, a young mutant Emma wanted to acquire and Storm wishes to nurture. This conflict over Kitty had an arc over several stories, including one where Emma Frost and Storm switched bodies. Both of them wished to teach the girl, impart their particular values to her. It was intriguing to watch. In many ways it was a battle for mutant future. Whose path would this young representative of their kind choose to follow?

Kitty’s loyalties were to Ororo, much as Luke’s were to Ben. Kitty did, however, have the potential to become a member of the Hellfire Club, which Emma pointed out to her several times, just as Luke had the potential to become one of the Sith. (In truth, it was Leia’s morals which were challenged, who found herself veering closer to the darkness in Jason Aaron’s comics, but that’s another story.) Conflicts with their mentors led both Kitty and Luke to question their mentors, leaving them more vulnerable to the other’s outstretched hands.

Those who shape our beliefs have a lot of power over us. Their visions live on through us. Those we shape carry on our thoughts and ideas. They carry on a vital part of us, even when we’re no longer here.

If two viewpoints come into conflict, two ways of life, two paths are destined to struggle to reach their goals, those on these paths want others to follow them. They could strive against each other for a particularly gifted and potentially strong student, who has the ability to take this path further.

It’s one of the most intense, powerful forms of conflict I’ve ever encountered. Perhaps this is why in story, I find it fascinating.

I just finished reading Vampire Game after all these years, wanting to return to one of my favorite manga series, giving each volume a rating and review for Goodreads.

Much as I enjoy it, one thing which never satisfied me was the answer to the Phelios question.

Warning, this is where things get spoilery. If you haven’t read Vampire Game (and it’s an excellent manga which I strongly recommend picking up) you may want to wait on reading this blog until you’ve finished it.

There’s been plenty of hints that Phelios may have been in love with the Vampire King Duzell. Ishtar once asked Duzell if he’d been in love with Phelios. He replied that his was the stupidest question she’d ever asked.

Was it? Why did Duzell devote himself to hunting down Phelios? Why did Phelios tell Duzell that he wanted the vampire king to be his, only to forge Sidia, and cast La Gamme, destroying both of them?

More than revenge, I think Duzell wanted the answers to those questions.

And what of Phelios? What did he want badly enough to die in battle for? Enough to reincarnate as Duzell’s brother in the last pages of the last volume of Vampire Game?

Duzell and Phelios didn’t just reincarnate as brothers either. They reincarnated as Ishtar and Darres’s sons.

Whose dying wish was to reborn in his next life with Ishtar and Darres? Whose blood was never sampled by Duzell before he died, even though he cut himself and offered it for the vampire king to sample? Who gave Duzell a dramatic, teasing look in the very first volume, back when Duzell was pretending to be a krawl kitten? Who was devious, manipulative, heroic, and caring, much like Phelios himself may well have been? Who put those qualities to work for Pheliostra and the people he loved, pitting them against Sharlen, the enemy of the realm and the heir to Duzell’s former dark dreams? Who else would have had the nerve to call the Holy Knight Phelios inconsiderate other Phelios’s reincarnation himself? (Well, Ishtar would have, but everyone, including Duzell himself thought she was his reincarnation at first.)

Perhaps someone who’d proved throughout the series that he had a melancholy, self hating, self destructive streak under his teasing smile. Someone who always wanted what he couldn’t have, yet did the best he could for everyone around him.

Think about it.

This is a very busy month. Too busy to blog. At least that’s what a part of me is arguing. I’m currently juggling edits, Camp NaNoWriMo, and a dozen other projects.

At least, I’ve learned how to keep a cooler head about it. I’m no longer panicking. That’s progress! :)

It’s a careful balancing act, writing and social media. I’ve tried to get myself in the habit of blogging three times a week at the Cauldron of Eternal Inspiration. The one at inspirationcauldron.wordpress.com. I’m posting my preludes to ‘Tales of the Navel/The Shadow Forest’ there three times a week. Once on Monday, because that’s Me Me Monday’, official promotion day at Queer Sci Fi on Facebook. (I try to be active in Queer Sci Fi. I even write a monthly column for them, ‘Sources of Inspiration’.) Wednesday, because it’s QueerBlogWed, a custom the remarkable and talented Charli Coty suggested. Blog something queer every Wednesday. We were to tweet about it using the hashtag #QueerBlogWed. I haven’t been so good at the latter. Blogging every Wednesday about something queer stuck. :) Saturday, because that’s the day my beloved Rainbow Snippets posts six sentences of GLBTQ+ fiction and shares them. I can’t always to make it to the Rainbow Snippets site, but I try to always post.

That’s three visits a week for inspirationcauldron.wordpress.com

Alas, the Forbidden Cauldron doesn’t get nearly as much attention, because it’s exactly that, forbidden. Facebook blocked inspirationcauldron.blogspot.com during the Blogging From A-Z Challenge in 2016. I’m more active in Facebook than any other social medium. This means my poor little Cauldron doesn’t get as much attention. I try to visit it once a week, often with a story prompted by the excellent Paula Wyant (To see her Wednesday Words, go to ptwyant.com.) I post the same story at my Facebook Author Page. This way, my Forbidden Cauldron manages to get a little action once a week.

What about this place? What about rhodrymavelyne.dreamwidth.org?

Originally I came here, looking for a place where I could host other authors and blog about myself. My characters and stories have slowly taken over my Cauldrons. cauldronkeeper.livejournal.com was taking on the more traditional role of a blog. I wrote about myself, mainly my issues as a writer there. When offering to host other writers, I’d point them in the direction of cauldronkeeper.livejournal.com. It seemed like the best blog for guests. Pictures/images come and go like the Cheshire Cat at inspirationcauldron.wordpress.com. They don’t always show up at the Cauldron itself. inspirationcauldron.blogspot.com was being blocked by Facebook. cauldronkeeper.livejournal.com became the space for me to blog as a professional author. In the meantime, my characters and stories overran the Cauldrons like a horde of mad muppets. :)

Only livejournal changed ownership recently. The change concerned me. Would I still be able to blog freely there? Was it still a place I could host other authors?

I wasn’t sure. I went looking for alternatives. I found this place. I examined the guidelines. The ’No promotion’ rule dashed some of my hopes. ‘No promotion’ might very well mean I post other author’s book covers and official blurbs here. I still went ahead and got the account. I wasn’t able to use the name cauldronkeeper.dreamwidth.org. If you see that handle, it’s not me. :)

I decided to use an old nickname that I went by at Archive of Our Own, Twitter, tumblr, NaNoWriMo, Camp NaNoWriMo, and both of my Cauldrons. It belonged to a character I created for a roleplaying game long ago. I’ve been reinventing him ever since. Rhodry Mavelyne is whom he became in the Keep, a yaoi interactive fantasy story telling experience which remains particularly dear to my heart, even though it ended long ago. I used his name at my first livejournal in 2003. It made sense to use it.

rhodrymavelyne with its fannish associations from Archive of Our Own shaped the identity of this particular blog. This would be where the fangirl/reader and the writer would blend into one. This is where I’ve blogged about ‘Yuri on Ice’, ‘Summer in Berlin’, and other things which have inspired me. This is where I’ve brought up my characters’s past selves in roleplaying games.

The borders between my online identities are always shifting. Already I’m longing to blog about some of the changes I’m making to the newest edition of ‘Fairest’. Part of me feels like I should do it at cauldronkeeper.livejournal.com. Another part longs to do it here.

Who knows how this place may shift and change in the future?

I’m going to do my best to keep it alive. This is why I’m going to try to update rhodrymavelyne.dreamwidth.org at least once a month. We’ll see how well I succeed.