Alrriiggghhttttt.

Alrriiggghhttttt.

First in defense of Lenore; she went through the whole ass maze thing with pluto and Duke. Unlike most of the other students none of them had specters so they had to rely on each other through and through. That a guaranteed recipe for trust and loyalty.

She didn't go through that with Annabel which made her much more trusting of these two especially.

Let's remember that Annabel is also so manipulative and it's fucking hard and alot of the time dumb to completely trust someone who you know is very manipulative

Now that I defended her let's throw some well deserved dirt on her;

Lenore doesn't fucking get how serious and deadly the whole situation is, she's living in her little dululu land that everything can work out perfectly without anyone having to die

To her what Annabel is doing is unnecessary and cruel without reason. Why else would Annabel spend her time scheming and planning downfalls when she could try to look for other ways even if there is none; it's not like they could die any second in a literal goddamn death game!

(I think at one point she says quote for quote that she needs to get Annabel to see reason when she is the one being blind to their situation)

Biggest prove of this is her literally making a blood oath with the misfits without telling them about the fucking wild hunt that's making its way to the academy to kill her as they talk

In conclusion: lenore is too fucking deep in her delusions and savior complex to even try to understand why Annabel is doing all of that to save them

Want to put my Nevermore thoughts on paper real quick, essentially talking to myself

In the simplest of terms, how it all feels to me boils down to this:

Annabel Lee lost a wife Lenore didn't lose anything (but I'm being told she has)

Like, genuinely Lenore's words have always felt like empty platitudes and I cannot for the life of me tell if that's intentional or not.

Considering that moment in Dreamland where she says "I lost you both" I feel like that isn't supposed to be the case? And yet even THAT moment feels empty and devoid of weight even as I'm literally watching her cry about it.

And I think that just comes from the fact that, for this to not feel like the case, Lenore should have had Annabel as a priority AT FIRST while trying (and failing) to stand between the Misfits and her but that has literally never been the case. Her priority has always, always been the Misfits and she's always, always questioning Annabel.

Like she had Annabel as a priority for...the first 5 chapters and then never again the moment she met Duke.

In a visual sense: Lenore should be in front of Annabel with her back to her defensively while facing the Misfits, but instead, her back is to the Misfits defensively while she's facing Annabel.

Even when she's alone with Annabel she's consistently facing her and questioning her every word. There's no trust, not even on an instinctive level, it's all halting indulgence.

That's why the moments she does have, where she says "I'll miss you" or "She's the one who brought me back to life" or "I lost you both" or "I don't know what I'd do with myself if you fell" just feel fake to me. Because there is no change in her character when she has such revelations; she's still standing with her back to the Misfits and facing Annabel.

Like, I don't even want these two bitches to get together LMAO What is there to root for here,,,

It's not even about them not seeing eye-to-eye or projecting onto each other or whatever. Lenore, current Lenore, has a foundational problem with how Annabel thinks. And considering how season 2 started off, I fear the narrative itself also has a problem with how she thinks and I'm going to be watching said Plot twist Annabel into a pretzel so she can get """character development""" because she's not caring enough and sacrificing enough for random individuals she doesn't KNOW in a death game while ignorant of the fact there is a way out for multiple people at once. Even if she HADN'T been ignorant of that fact, I still wouldn't be holding her caring for Lenore alone against her.

Their whole drama just feels convoluted to shit, considering we as the readers would have had the same amount of "oh shit" feeling solely because of the flashbacks we got from Annabel's point of view. Lenore being made to say/think all of these random confessions feel utterly unnecessary.

Even disregarding all of the previous paragraphs, they aren't even fun in a """toxic""" (and by god am I using that word with a mountain of salt) yuri sense. <- this being more of a personal gripe, I suppose

Lenore's just too morally self-righteous and the narrative (a.k.a another character) has yet to call her out of it (like it constantly calls out someone like Montresor), and I have no idea if it ever will. Annabel did call her out on it, but the plot had a convenient excuse to turn it around on her courtesy of Lenore just having remembered the "Annabel leaving her" memory.

We'll see what happens, I'd like to be wrong in this instance.

Perhaps season 1 was a season reserved for "Annabel in the wrong and Lenore in the right" while season 2 will be a "Lenore in the wrong and Annabel in the right" thing.

Who knows