Castlevania thoughts: s4 Lenore
Dec. 6th, 2021 09:32 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
schneefinkInstead of the other things I should be writing, Yuletide or uni related, I finally wrote the Castlevania post about Lenore that I've been thinking about for weeks. It's all Reddit's fault.
There were things I liked and things I liked less about season 4, but overall I thought the ending was satisfying. Isaac defeating Carmilla, with help from Hector, in 4x06 was great, and I didn't think we'd see them again. I was glad that Morana and Striga survived, even, and I was unsurprised that Hector asked Isaac to keep Lenore alive.
Then we got that final scene with Hector and Lenore in 4x10, in which they have a conversation about Carmilla and power, and then Lenore kills herself. "Having been shown what I am, having found that I have been living a lie, here I am, in a cage, a dangerous animal… […] I'm not going to sit in a cage, Hector. Not even with you. […] I refuse to exist like this. […] Hector, it's fine. It's what I want to do."
It was nice to get that conclusion. I was glad for Hector that she was gone, too, because I think he'd have stayed with her out of sentimentality alone, and the constant reminder of the suffering and betrayal etc. would have made it much harder to start a new chapter of his life.
So I was surprised to find out on Reddit that many people apparently hated Lenore's ending specifically. Some said that it was out of character for Hector to let her die, that it was unfair that she died while others who've done evil didn't, even that she was a vampire queen and would never have left the people she's responsible for behind like that and should have become Isaac's advisor.
Tbh my first and second reactions were WTF. It took me a while to understand where these reactions were coming from: from people who apparently thought that Lenore in s4 was no longer mostly a villain but instead a protagonist, and also that she and Hector were in a genuine romantic relationship.
Which… is absolutely not how I saw it. Lenore is a villain. She was a villain in s3, when she seduced and enslaved Hector, and she's still a villain in s4, when she continues to keep Hector enslaved. Being nice to him, making sure he's living in comfort, and being concerned for his safety don't actually make up for the fact that she was keeping him enslaved.
And Hector being nice to her and developing some fondness for her doesn't change anything about that either. It was only sensible for him to be nice to her and make sure she feels fond of him, and Hector is too soft-hearted not to develop some actual feelings along the way (she was his only source of comfort, after all), but he was also immediately willing to betray her. Yes he convinced Isaac to let her live, but if Isaac had disagreed Hector wouldn't have been able to stop him and he knew that, he accepted that outcome. And after that slavery ends they have a friendly conversation and he still seems to care for her, but that too doesn't erase what happened.
Yes, other characters who did evil things got a chance for atonement or at least a fresh start: Isaac and Hector, for example, and even Dracula. But that only worked because the show spent a lot of time with them. It would have taken a LOT of time for Lenore to have a halfway plausible atonement arc. She barely started accepting that someone else than her sisters could matter, and it was the person she kept as a pet. Humans, overall, are little better than livestock to her. It would also have been very difficult for Hector who really deserves better than to have to support the person who enslaved him (though he would probably disagree at first.) And I don't think that there was a way to show convincingly enough that Lenore was even on a road to atonement. Leaving her alive would just leave a thread dangling and one day she might become a problem again.
As for Lenore being a queen who wouldn't have abandoned her subjects, we never saw her give any indication that she values the country or people she "ruled" over. She enjoyed ruling together with her sisters, she enjoyed the strength it gave her, but actual ruling? She called herself a diplomat but we didn't once see her practice actual diplomacy, only manipulation. When it looked like there was no place for a diplomat she never once considered what else she could do. Lenore had a comfortable life that didn't force her to do anything she didn't want to do, and she wanted that life back. Carmilla suddenly revealing how power-hungry she is and planning a conquest was a bigger barrier for that than she anticipated or wanted to admit, but she always thought that once the conquest was finished things would go back to how they had been. As she told Hector, unsurprisingly, she was unwilling to try and figure out how to live "in a cage," i.e. in a situation not under her control. Even though it appeared to be a comfortable one!
In conclusion, I think Lenore dying was the best ending for her character, and that her deciding to commit suicide was not out of character. (And probably also the best choice, imo: Isaac could have done it, but that would have created at least a temporary rift between him and Hector, and I - and the show - care much more for them than her.)
I'm arguing with nobody here but obviously it bothered me enough to write several hundred words about it, for some reason, idk. Hopefully this at least got it out of my head.
There were things I liked and things I liked less about season 4, but overall I thought the ending was satisfying. Isaac defeating Carmilla, with help from Hector, in 4x06 was great, and I didn't think we'd see them again. I was glad that Morana and Striga survived, even, and I was unsurprised that Hector asked Isaac to keep Lenore alive.
Then we got that final scene with Hector and Lenore in 4x10, in which they have a conversation about Carmilla and power, and then Lenore kills herself. "Having been shown what I am, having found that I have been living a lie, here I am, in a cage, a dangerous animal… […] I'm not going to sit in a cage, Hector. Not even with you. […] I refuse to exist like this. […] Hector, it's fine. It's what I want to do."
It was nice to get that conclusion. I was glad for Hector that she was gone, too, because I think he'd have stayed with her out of sentimentality alone, and the constant reminder of the suffering and betrayal etc. would have made it much harder to start a new chapter of his life.
So I was surprised to find out on Reddit that many people apparently hated Lenore's ending specifically. Some said that it was out of character for Hector to let her die, that it was unfair that she died while others who've done evil didn't, even that she was a vampire queen and would never have left the people she's responsible for behind like that and should have become Isaac's advisor.
Tbh my first and second reactions were WTF. It took me a while to understand where these reactions were coming from: from people who apparently thought that Lenore in s4 was no longer mostly a villain but instead a protagonist, and also that she and Hector were in a genuine romantic relationship.
Which… is absolutely not how I saw it. Lenore is a villain. She was a villain in s3, when she seduced and enslaved Hector, and she's still a villain in s4, when she continues to keep Hector enslaved. Being nice to him, making sure he's living in comfort, and being concerned for his safety don't actually make up for the fact that she was keeping him enslaved.
And Hector being nice to her and developing some fondness for her doesn't change anything about that either. It was only sensible for him to be nice to her and make sure she feels fond of him, and Hector is too soft-hearted not to develop some actual feelings along the way (she was his only source of comfort, after all), but he was also immediately willing to betray her. Yes he convinced Isaac to let her live, but if Isaac had disagreed Hector wouldn't have been able to stop him and he knew that, he accepted that outcome. And after that slavery ends they have a friendly conversation and he still seems to care for her, but that too doesn't erase what happened.
Yes, other characters who did evil things got a chance for atonement or at least a fresh start: Isaac and Hector, for example, and even Dracula. But that only worked because the show spent a lot of time with them. It would have taken a LOT of time for Lenore to have a halfway plausible atonement arc. She barely started accepting that someone else than her sisters could matter, and it was the person she kept as a pet. Humans, overall, are little better than livestock to her. It would also have been very difficult for Hector who really deserves better than to have to support the person who enslaved him (though he would probably disagree at first.) And I don't think that there was a way to show convincingly enough that Lenore was even on a road to atonement. Leaving her alive would just leave a thread dangling and one day she might become a problem again.
As for Lenore being a queen who wouldn't have abandoned her subjects, we never saw her give any indication that she values the country or people she "ruled" over. She enjoyed ruling together with her sisters, she enjoyed the strength it gave her, but actual ruling? She called herself a diplomat but we didn't once see her practice actual diplomacy, only manipulation. When it looked like there was no place for a diplomat she never once considered what else she could do. Lenore had a comfortable life that didn't force her to do anything she didn't want to do, and she wanted that life back. Carmilla suddenly revealing how power-hungry she is and planning a conquest was a bigger barrier for that than she anticipated or wanted to admit, but she always thought that once the conquest was finished things would go back to how they had been. As she told Hector, unsurprisingly, she was unwilling to try and figure out how to live "in a cage," i.e. in a situation not under her control. Even though it appeared to be a comfortable one!
In conclusion, I think Lenore dying was the best ending for her character, and that her deciding to commit suicide was not out of character. (And probably also the best choice, imo: Isaac could have done it, but that would have created at least a temporary rift between him and Hector, and I - and the show - care much more for them than her.)
I'm arguing with nobody here but obviously it bothered me enough to write several hundred words about it, for some reason, idk. Hopefully this at least got it out of my head.
no subject
Date: 2021-12-06 09:34 pm (UTC)I cynically feel that people didn't see her as the villain she very clearly was because she was sweet and pretty and caught her flies with honey, unlike Carmilla, whose villainy (and insanity) was very different. Also, unlike Hector, Isaac, and Dracula, her character was evil from the start.
no subject
Date: 2021-12-06 09:56 pm (UTC)I thought it made sense that Isaac didn't kill her: keeping her alive was both a peace offering to his alliance with Hector, a potential bargaining chip, and a test. But it would have felt unfinished if we hadn't seen her again after 4x06.
no subject
Date: 2021-12-07 08:27 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2021-12-07 11:09 pm (UTC)