These are very good points. What struck me is the initial similarity in the way Eric wooed Pam and tried to woo Sookie. He tried negotiating with both women. The difference is that Pam was satisfied with his offer, and Sookie was not.
I think there’s another difference, too — and that’s that Eric isn’t really “wooing” Pam, he is straightforwardly bargaining for a moment of intimacy with her. I think it’s clear that Eric has a long history of avoiding emotional entanglement, and I think that he would have been satisfied with paying Pam and receiving her services in return. I don’t think he wanted “Everything” from Pam. I do think he is truly wooing Sookie — and that he wouldn’t be satisfied with payment and services rendered. He is emotionally involved with her in a way he never was, and likely never has been with Pam.
Once Eric eliminated the other vampires preying on her women, Pam was ready to sleep with him. Although it was not wholly mercenary, both of them treated it as a business arrangement.
I agree. I think Pam would be willing to “pay” for his protection, but I don’t necessarily think she wants a vampire boyfriend, and Eric doesn’t want Pam forever, he only wants her as a temporary salve for his loneliness. Even in trying to force him to turn her, Pam isn’t saying she loves him, or feels emotional about him — in fact, she tells him she would be fine with him changing her and leaving her. Their coupling is a business transaction. Eric wants to feel some honest connection with someone, and Pam is willing to give him that for a price.
Eric tried almost this exact strategy on Sookie in 4x02. He told her he bought her with the house, then he offered to protect her. In both promises, there was an implied, business-like tit-for-tat. Sookie rejected these offers without a second thought. Only Eric’s third attempt, in which he admitted to caring for her, gave her any pause.
This is one of the big differences between Eric’s relationship with Sookie and his with Pam. Although he later grew to love Pam, when he first slept with her he basically bought her favors. Sookie won’t be bought. She wants to love the men sleeps with; in fact, she turns Eric down after he tells her he cares for her because she isn’t certain she can return his feelings.
Yes — Sookie is not a prostitute, and rightly sees a relationship with him that is characterised by an exchange of favours as a form of prostitution. Pam is more worldly and less romantic than Sookie is, and transactions of that sort are her profession. For Pam, it’s honest and straighforward, and she doesn’t have to pretend it’s anything else. Sookie is incapable of pretending.
This idealism, naive as it may be, explains Eric’s intense devotion to Sookie. In the past, he kept his sexual relationships businesslike. Pam is one example. His agreement with Yvetta (a job and good sex) is another. What happened with Sookie isn’t even in the same ballpark as these relationships. As Eric admitted, they each gave themselves completely. There wasn’t any reckoning of favors owed, or what sex was worth. They gave everything, and received everything in return.
Yes.
It must have been a staggering change for Eric, who is so used to bartering sex. The great loves of his life to this point have not been sexual. He loved his human family, he loved Godric, Nora, and Pam (his vampire family). But even though he slept with Pam and Nora, the love was familial rather than romantic. His relationship with Sookie breaks all of those rules. It’s hardly surprising that he’s been bowled over by his feelings.
Indeed. In fact, even in his human life, it’s clear that Eric did not necessarily associate sex with love — I mean, I’m sure he liked the goat girl and all the other ladies whose legs he spent his life between, but since he was clearly something of a playboy, it’s also clear his heart was not involved. His sex with Nora is similar — they are family, and they express that love sexually, but it’s not romantic. To truly make love, and hold nothing back — body, heart, soul, blood — and to give it to a fragile human girl must be truly overwhelming to him, since he appears to have spent 1000 years avoiding that level of involvement with anyone.
(Source: spuffyfeels)
Season 1 scenes between Eric/Pam and Bill take on a whole new meaning in light of the San Francisco flashback.
If this was the last time they saw Bill, as the vampire who was draining and killing Pam’s prostitutes, it’s no surprise they’re not taking his “mainstreaming” seriously. Their hostility and contempt also make more sense—Lorena and Bill murdered Pam’s workers and tried (ineffectually) to kill them. There’s no love lost between Bill and Eric.
Given that Bill worked for Sophie-Anne for 30 some years, I don’t think 1905 was the last time Eric saw him. Sophie-Anne also kind of implied that they always had hostility with each other, and that means she saw them together more than once.
But the point still stands.
When we watched the first season, without that knowledge, Eric and Pam just seemed arrogant and malicious. They appeared contemptuous of Bill’s mainstreaming, which we assumed meant they used humans as carelessly as Malcolm, Diane, and Liam. We just assumed their viciousness and depravity were a little more carefully concealed, since they were in a public place.
And that was a deliberate impression the show was letting us assume, because back then we were in Sookie’s shoes: We only knew what Bill told us and had no reason yet not to believe him. Certainly Malcolm, Diane, and Liam weren’t making us question his assertion that he was the only vampire who actually mainstreamed. :)
What a contrast to the sweet, square couple of Bill and Sookie! Just to fulfill more of Sookie and the audience’s stereotyped expectations, both Eric and Pam seem to be coming on to Sookie, eyefucking her while trying to lure her away from Bill. He claims her, protecting her from the other, scary vampires. Sookie, freaked out, scurries to his side and meekly agrees that she belongs to Bill.
And Bill played it for all he was worth. He made Sookie apprehensive of all other vampires, he made her vary of Eric even before they approached him, and he was giving off such strained vibes that Sookie picked up on “danger, Will Robinson! Danger!” :) Even without strange vampires ogling her, she was already primed to cling to Bill for protection.
And yet, she presented unafraid face to Eric. She challenged him. And that made him notice her. Really notice her as a person, not just as a pretty arm candy of Bill’s.
This plot is ripped from every gothic novel ever. The innocent couple, the seductive, evil demon lover … this is a hoary chestnut of genre plots.
Just the sort of thing True Blood loves to twist, mock, and subvert.
YES!
We should have clued in then that there was more to this scene than the obvious surface, but too many viewers thought that the show was a gothic soap opera. They took it seriously, when they should have been looking for the moments that didn’t conform—the suggestion that Bill, Pam and Eric already knew each other, Sookie’s unexpectedly spunky reply when Eric calls her sweet, “Not really,” Bill’s possessiveness—all clues that much more was going on under the surface than we were aware of.
To be fair, back then it was impossible to know. This is one of those scenes that changes the meaning completely with more information we gather later. At first blush, it would have been impossible to read it like that. The fact that there are still people who read as text with no attention to subtext is what boggles the mind. But they are hopeless. This show is not for the literal or the inattentive. :)
This is a show MEANT to be retconned. Without it, you accept the cliched surface narrative and completely miss what’s actually going on. Which is why rewatching the show is so much fun.
Again: YES!
And I believe more and more things will come back like that later on. :)
Nodding.
(Source: batmaned)
One thing we can say about Eric Northman: his love is real. I knew they’d patch it up. But, this is interesting. Does he mean because HE is so great (I mean, I think he’s great and all, but it’s usually best to let someone else say it)? Or is this more about his vampire lineage? I want to know what comes before and after this sentence.
Exactly. Is this a tribute to himself, or to Godric? Judging by earlier seasons, this would be about being part of Godric’s lineage, but we’ll have to wait and see when it airs.
Indeed. It doesn’t seem a very “Eric” thing to say, if it’s not about Godric, somehow. It sounds more like something Pam would say about him and herself — it reflects all the things she’s always saying about him being a hero, the best maker a girl could ever have, etc. Plus, the basement scene, with two coffins? And, if Eric and Bill are joined at the kinky staking harnesses, where is Bill for this tearful self-affirmation session? I’m staring to wonder if this might be Pam’s dream of reconciliation.
Just speculating. We shall see!
I wouldn’t take this as a dream. I think it’s a possible goodbye and a pep talk. Perhaps he is telling her this to encourage her to be a great maker. Godric was that for him, and he was that for Pam, and now that Pam is one, she will be great, too. At least he wants her to believe that, because you need confidence in your ability to take care of someone and Eric knows that.
In other words, I don’t necessarily think this is some abstract affirmation, I think it’s a very specific conversation about what she must do now, and why she can’t count on him being there every step of the way (he’s got the Authority on his ass, and she can’t follow him with Tara in toe). He is telling her she can do it, because she comes from a lineage of good makers, and she knows how to do it even if she hasn’t got Eric holding her hand through it.
You could very well be right. It just strikes me as a strange thing for him to say. I can’t wait for the context!
(Source: batmaned)
One thing we can say about Eric Northman: his love is real. I knew they’d patch it up. But, this is interesting. Does he mean because HE is so great (I mean, I think he’s great and all, but it’s usually best to let someone else say it)? Or is this more about his vampire lineage? I want to know what comes before and after this sentence.
Exactly. Is this a tribute to himself, or to Godric? Judging by earlier seasons, this would be about being part of Godric’s lineage, but we’ll have to wait and see when it airs.
Indeed. It doesn’t seem a very “Eric” thing to say, if it’s not about Godric, somehow. It sounds more like something Pam would say about him and herself — it reflects all the things she’s always saying about him being a hero, the best maker a girl could ever have, etc. Plus, the basement scene, with two coffins? And, if Eric and Bill are joined at the kinky staking harnesses, where is Bill for this tearful self-affirmation session? I’m staring to wonder if this might be Pam’s dream of reconciliation.
Just speculating. We shall see!
(Source: batmaned)
“You shouldn’t either”…. What does it mean? Is Eric suggesting Pam not to trust him anymore? I don’t understand.
I think it means that for whatever reason, they are all in very, very grave danger, and too much caution is not enough. I don’t know what developments would lead Eric to tell Pam not to trust him, but I think he is telling her that, and if he is, he has a good reason. I also think it’s clear in this scene that they are both suffering because they both love each other.
I just finished watching the Eric/Pam promo…
I don’t know why anyone would be surprised with the way Eric is treating Pam there. He gave her an order and she blatantly disobeyed it. He thought he could trust her, but she defied it. There has to be consequences for that, and this isn’t the first time Pam’s tried his patience, I’m sure. Hopefully they’ll unfuck their relationship by the end of the season.
Amen. Nothing to get het up about. Also, Eric SHOULD release Pam. It’s time. She can still choose to be his right hand if he releases her, but rather than being bound to serve him, as she is now, she would have to choose him. This should, I think, mirror Sookie — who also cannot belong to him or be bound to him by blood, fear or need for protection, but will have to choose him of her own free will if their relationship is to be meaningful and satisfying.
And, taking that further, consider Eric’s offer to Sookie at the beginning of season 4, that he would protect her, and she would repay him by being “his”, which would basically make her a kind of indentured whore. He is used to relationships that operate like transactions, and doesn’t seem to realise how truly unattractive his offer is. Sookie refuses him like any self-respecting woman should, because no matter how smoking hot he is, that transaction is not a basis for a relationship.
One of the things I am most looking forward to in the next season is knowing more about the foundation of Eric and Pam’s relationship. Pam serves him because she loves him; her love for him is the deepest thing about her. However, none of that changes the fact that she is a bound and indentured servant, and until the end of season 4, it wasn’t even clear that she COULD disobey him. In fact, it was only the most dire provocation, the need to safeguard HIS survival that prompted her disobedience. Eric protects and provides for her, and she dresses like a pretty doll, and does his bidding.
I would think that Pam fans would want to see her released by him.
This is all true, but I really, really hope that Eric does not release Pam right after they had such a grave fight. It would only make things worse between them. Pam would think that Eric is releasing her because he hates her now, doesn’t trust her anymore (which is not true, since Eric is simply acting out of anger and confusion and, if he calms down and thinks about it, he will know that Pam will never betray him), and wants her gone for good. On the other hand Eric will only make a rushed decision, one that he will not be able to take back. I too think that it’s time for Eric to release Pam… but not in this situation. If Eric releases Pam at the end of the season, after they have resolved their issues, I will be ok.
Well, I think Pam DID betray him by trying to kill Sookie. I think he is right to hold her at arm’s length for that, because while her motive was protecting him, she truly does not understand why protecting him in that way would have destroyed him. That said, I don’t think he hates her at all in this scene. Why would he say “I trust no one, and you shouldn’t either” if it’s not because he fears for her safety and wants her to know what she has to know to be appropriately wary? Why is he looking at her like that as she begs him to release her? He loves her, but he can’t quite trust her for legitimate reasons.
Having a fight or a rupture in a family doesn’t mean what follows is irreparable separation and hate. Sometimes people need to be apart for a time, and the reason why is that they have lost touch with one another and/or themselves in some deep and real way. I think this is true about Eric and Pam, and the reasons why are so obvious. I don’t think this fight, followed by him releasing her is any kind of deal-breaker or irreparable rupture.
Personally, I like that Eric isn’t cool and impervious — that he is angry, confused, afraid and acting out of emotion. In my opinion, we unreasonably expect a strong man never to falter. It’s hard to watch Eric be desperate and miserable, but I love it that he has feelings and a heart that can be broken, and I want to see him suffer when suffering is the natural, human response to his circumstances. The strength to pass through his fear and desperation holding onto what he most cares about is a necessary step to his freedom from what binds him, and I think that to truly love Pam, he has to let her go.
He and Pam have lost touch because the vampire she knew, loved and served is gone forever, and what is so, so right for Eric isn’t right for her anymore. In fact, Pam’s expectations are, I think, part of what binds him. Also, Pam styles herself an independent woman, but is she really? Eric freed her to fuck, kill and laugh to her heart’s content, but she is still his servant, and not her own woman. I think that when people are so close and have forgotten how to be who they are, sometimes it takes a violent wrench to set them free.
I hope he does release her in anger — if he does, their reconciliation will be sweetened by the fact that love and real friendship won over tremendous obstacles. And, let’s face it: on True Blood, that is the only way love can win.
Eric and Pam, End of Season 4
Eric’s face as Pam interrupts his important conversation with Sookie.
So many people were angry about the way he greeted Pam after coming back from his amnesia, but personally, I think he makes a heroic effort on her behalf, here. He’s just woken up to find that a cataclysmic change has happened in his heart, and he’s just been gutted by Sookie’s confession that she still loves Bill, and on top of that, who he is with Sookie is no longer the same guy he has to be to make Pam feel comfortable. Still, he rearranges his face and gets up to reassure her that he is still him, and that he loves her. He’s got the two women he loves here, and he’s trying to make both of them believe that he is who they need him to be, and meanwhile, he hardly knows himself.
The fact that Pam is hurt does not mean Eric didn’t do right by her — that he isn’t trying to show her he cares about her. I think one of the many things this show does very well is allowing it to be true that in a relationship with two people, what’s right for one might not be right for the other. One person can be heartbroken while the other is doing his best — doing the right thing. I’m surprised that so many people have more sympathy for Pam, here, than they do for Eric.
That’s because the complexity of this scene, and the complexity of what Eric feels goes right above some people’s heads.
The whole “Poor Pam, Eric chose Sookie over her” thing is silly. And not true. Because this isn’t a competition, a choice, a dilemma of any kind. His relationship with Pam and his relationship with Sookie are two different things. And his love for Sookie does not negate his love for Pam.
But that’s besides the point here. As you said, the sheer tremendous importance of what has just transpired for Eric, the earth-shuttering emotional discoveries? He can’t share it with Pam, because this can only be shared with someone who’s been through it with him. Sookie. Pam feels like an intruder on this moment, because she is an intruder. She has no part of this.
That doesn’t follow that she now, by extension, has no part of Eric’s life. That’s how Pam, herself, has interpreted it, but she is wrong. She isn’t used to sharing his affection, but this isn’t the same affection he is feeling, so the question of sharing is moot.
And as for Eric, he does make an effort here, because he does know what’s due Pam as his child, his ally, his best friend. That’s the ONLY reason why he tears himself away from one of the most important conversations of his very long life. Pam is the ONLY person he would even consider doing this for.
I have no doubt that they’ll sort it out. Pam is self-centered, but she isn’t stupid. She will understand sooner or later that Eric’s loyalties aren’t split, because this isn’t about getting a new best friend/side-kick/play pal. When she gets that, she’ll realize that her place in his life isn’t in jeopardy, because that’s not the place that Sookie is going to occupy.
And Eric will realize that Pam, for all her blaze attitude and tough exterior, occasionally needs reassurances.
This isn’t a deep, fundamental split in their relationship at all. This is a misunderstanding born out of unfamiliarity of the situation and lack of communication.
I agree. I think what strikes me most about this scene, and what I would just like to formally add to the long, long list of things I love about Eric, is his selflessness. He doesn’t rage at Sookie when she gives him the bad news, he listens and tries to understand. He doesn’t protect himself or hide his feelings, he reveals them, and shows her his pain and his love. When Pam arrives, he doesn’t deny her what is due her, he lets her interrupt and truly, isn’t even upset by having to do it — it’s simply what he has to do. He is patient and kind to both of them in the different ways that are appropriate to their different places in his heart and his life.
Sometimes how seriously wonderful a character Eric Northman is just kills me. I love this scene so much. This is one of those times.
Same here.
This is a great discussion, because lots of people seem to misunderstand Pam and Eric’s difficulties at the end of season 4. It’s not the end of their relationship. Neither one of them wants it to end, although Eric needs some time to cool off after Pam showed such disregard for Sookie’s safety.
I do love how hard he’s trying for both women in this scene. Sometimes, though, the best you can do isn’t sufficient. Eric can’t undo what happened while he forgot himself, and TBH probably doesn’t want to. He was happier during this time than he’d been in centuries. Of course it will change him. He can’t go back to being impervious and unaffected.
Honestly, he was never as emotionally untouched as Pam, although he hid it well. All the way back in season 2, when he said Godric was 10 times the vampire he would ever be, expressing his devotion to his maker quite baldly, Pam didn’t take him seriously and told him he didn’t do humble well. She didn’t realize that he could feel that deeply, and had trouble acknowledging it. She’s facing a similar difficulty in facing his feelings for Sookie, with the added complication that Sookie isn’t conveniently dead (like Godric is). She isn’t a powerful vampire, either, but an insignificant little human (with a touch of fairy). All of this is galling to Pam, upending her own certainties.
I think Pam has a long history of being a bit insensitive and insubordinate — it’s part of her charm — but yes, she doesn’t understand any of Eric’s deeper, softer feelings. She has no understanding of his feelings about Godric until she’s faced with the possibility of losing him, and then her solution for him is to use Sookie to save himself and her. She doesn’t know about his blood oath to avenge his family, or about his growing feelings for Sookie. She repeatedly and continuously shows no sensitivity to his emotional state. Her relationship to him is very childish — she relies on him to be the strong one who’s in charge, no matter what. She doesn’t see vulnerability or softness in him.
Pam has expectations of Eric, that are very difficult for him to fulfil while he’s trying to deal with his emotional cataclysm. He has a secret self that only Sookie knows, and when Pam arrives, he is not ready or able to be the smart-talking, buttoned-up-tight badass that she knows. He’s open, aching and in love. He can’t be who she needs him to be.
I love Pam as a character, as I think we all do, but she has got to have some catalyst for change and growth. In the last season, she lost her beauty and her strongest emotional tie. Even if the rupture in their relationship isn’t real — and I agree, it’s just miscommunication, not a real rupture — it feels like it is to her, and at this point, I think the choice is hers: she can either continue to rail against Sookie, in which case she will alienate Eric more seriously, or she can look more closely at who he is. I do have a feeling that it’ll get worse before it gets better… but in the end, Pam loves him, and he loves Pam. Love will win. Sookie is no more a part of that equation than Pam is a part of what transpires between Eric and Sookie.
At any rate, my sympathies in this scene lie firmly with Eric. He is having a rough night.
SNIP
Brava! Yes, I don’t think I’d like it if there was a sexual component to their relationship in the show. It’s been written and acted so paternally up to this point that it would seem weird and squicky if Eric was suddenly macking on Pam. I know that they were lovers for a while in the books before Pam decided she liked women more than men. But their relationship in the books is much less protective/father-cum-daughter. They are more partners in the books.
Look at that scene above. He’s totally her “dad” there. Tender, not at all lustful or sexual.
I DO like Pam a lot. She’s painfully honest. She says whatever comes to mind, and there isn’t a speck of sentimentality in her. Her line in season one about getting chill bumps from watching Sookie and Bill’s passionate farewell thus now strikes me as a moment when the writers were still struggling to find her “voice.” True Pam might have commented that they were really in love, with a disdainful sniff, but she wouldn’t have been emotionally touched by that. Not with the thinly veiled contempt she has for Bill, or any emotional displays. She is a great “voice of reason” when Eric succumbs to emotion.
THIS IS NOT TO SAY THAT PAM IS THE VOICE OF TRUTH ON THE SHOW. On other message boards I have seen people try to anoint various characters as omniscient truth-tellers, from Pam to Tara. There is no single voice of truth on this show. Which is entirely as it should be.
In real life, NO ONE has a monopoly on truth. No one is divinely blessed to always be right (thank goodness). We’re going to have to figure out what’s going on in True Blood without the crutch of some oracular character. Every character, even the most unrepentant villains, gets to tell an important truth at some point on the show. That’s part of the fun—you can’t tune out what anyone is saying, because they all might spill something important. At the same time, you can’t completely trust anyone, because even the most intelligent and well-intentioned characters are stuck in their own POVs. They can’t know everything. And their perspective may be flawed, because of emotion or bias. Sometimes people lie, too, for whatever reasons. It’s a challenging show, because of this complexity, but also FUN. And as we have seen in the True Blood fandom, this lends itself to arguments, because there’s always ambiguity.
ITA with UFG when she wrote that Pam simply doesn’t feel as deeply as Eric. I don’t think she responds to Eric’s emotional turmoil because she doesn’t grasp it. Her emotions are stunted. This makes her a great voice of reason, when everyone else around her goes crazy with emotion (like Eric and Bill’s suicide pact to save Sookie in 4x11). It doesn’t make her a great confidante or emotional anchor. That may be why amnesia Eric seemed perfectly happy with Sookie, away from Pam. His undamaged emotions (I believe he lost his memory, but not his emotional connections) told him that Sookie was reliable, that he could trust and lean on her. He knows he can trust Pam, that he cares for her, but not that he can rely on her to empathize with him. And she doesn’t. She’s pretty clueless about his reactions throughout season four. Sookie, for all her overt mistrust of Eric, is tenderhearted and sympathetic to him. Pam possesses absolutely no empathy; she’s just not tenderhearted.
Harris seems to like that toughness and lack of sentiment because it’s unusual (she mentioned this in an interview). Usually men are the stoic ones and women have emotional depth. But I think her implicit message is that isn’t this a bit sexist, really, to assume that all women are sentimental and all men insensitive? It’s fun (she said) to write a female character who is so tough and no-nonsense. Harris plays a lot with gender and sexuality in the series. Pam’s characterization, show and books, is an example of that.
Pam is extremely feminine (her designer clothes, all the makeup, the pink and girly stuff), but she’s also a stone cold bitch and a lesbian. She’s not really slottable into any stereotype of dykes or women generally. She’s a real human being (even as a vampire), with all the variation that implies.
Anyway, I think that Pam has tried to empathize with Eric, and it’s not like she is completely emotion-proof. She was shocked when she learnt about Eric’s human family, and she was hurt by the fact that Eric never shared the saddest part of his past with her. I saw her reaction to that as a genuine desire to be Eric’s confident, and a disappointment in realizing that she has never been, not for the important issues. I think part of what Pam is comes straight from her true nature, but part is also a product of Eric’s teachings that now have come to bite him in the ass. When he turned Pam, choosing her as a companion of death, he recognized in her the qualities he valued (her lack of sentiment, her cynicism, her coldness) and, I believe, he trained her to nourish only those aspects of her personality, and to systematically atone every hint of feeling, to the point that she ended up having none. Because Eric thought it was the best he could teach to Pam, to survive in the vampire world. I believe that the potential loss of Eric, combined with the newly found knowledge that her Maker has never been the piece of stone she always thought, is exactly what will trigger some emotional character growth in Pam and, ultimately, will help her reconnect with Eric.
All of this is true. I don’t mean to say that Pam can’t feel deeply, just that she doesn’t, and that Eric does not share that part of himself with her. I also completely agree that her stunted emotional life is at least partially Eric’s influence. He taught her what he thought was best, and what his very revered maker taught him. He was cold, and he taught her to be cold.
But, I also agree with Ohiogurl when she says that Pam didn’t respond to or empathise with Eric’s emotional turmoil because she does not recognise it for what it is, or understand it. She does not have tumultuous feelings. She leads her life sheltered by him, and doesn’t have to face anything that could shake her out of her comfortable feelinglessness — until now, because if there is one thing Pam feels deeply, it is her love for Eric. People get so upset about seeing these characters suffer emotionally; Eric when Sookie chose to be alone, and Pam when Eric sends her away… But this pain they feel is the only reason they have to grow and change.
Pam’s pain is the best thing for her, as Eric’s is for him. And, for us? It means SO MUCH GREAT STORY TO COME.
(via tempella)
True Blood Challenge - 06. Favorite Eric/Pam moment
I love their relationship but i don’t “ship” them romantically and never will. I know they were “lovers” but i just can’t. He is her papa!
I ship them in a non-sexual way too. It’s not about him being her “daddy”, because actually he isn’t, and in TB/SVM sexual relationships between Maker and Child are pretty common… It’s simply because I prefer their relationship to be the way it is, asexual, the two of them being a team. I like Eric ordering her around and Pam being all annoyed and stuff. Sometimes he acts like her older brother, sometimes like her dad. Sometimes they are equals and share a kind of comradeship. I like this, and I like that there’s no sex at all.
Though I would appreciate if, in the flashback, they showed how their first years together were like… we all know Eric pulled Pam’s strings a lot, back then!
Oh, don’t get me wrong, of course i want to see that too!
I know maker/child relationship at least a little time is sexual but like you i like the way they are. Is like seem him having sexual relationship with Godric; or Bill having sex with Jessica. Just suits so wrong to me, they are “pals”, you know? It is like imagine me and my best friend since my childhood making sex. And i don’t why i feel that way since i am not so prude.
I guess that’s because Eric and Pam know each other for so long, it’s really awkward to picture them in a sexual contest given how their relationship is now. But at the beginning, Eric didn’t know Pam at all (we can assume that he “stalked” her for a certain period before turning her, like Godric did for him, but still he didn’t “know” her yet), and Pam was a beautiful woman, newly turned, and full of heightened emotions: can’t believe these two never felt any attraction towards each other…
However with Bill/Jess it feels wrong because, you know, she is so young, and Bill is so old! Bill would be like a pedophile if he goes sexual with Jess. EEK! Eric/Godric, well, I don’t know. I don’t see their Maker/Child relationship as sexual either, but it’s hard to tell what happened during their first years.
There’s something really lovely about their relationship being un-sexual, I think. It’s so rare for a man and woman to be comrades in the way they are, and to respect and love each other without a sexual component. I like Eric’s egalitarianism in trusting her and having a woman as his “right hand man.” However, I also think that Pam is simply much shallower than Eric — at least in what we’ve been shown of her so far. She is not Eric’s equal in a very fundamental way, and it’s not just that she is younger and he is her maker, it’s that she does not feel as deeply as he does, and she is not asking herself existential questions the way his feelings are forcing him to do. On top of that, he hides his own depth from her, she is not someone that he shares himself with.
I love Pam and think she’s brilliant, but I also think she’s a bit of a spoiled brat, personally. Her “daddy” is rich and powerful, he protects her with the simple fact of who he is, and if that isn’t enough, he’ll protect her with his life. She gets everything she wants, and she’s demanding, petulant or worse when she doesn’t. She is insensitive to his feelings, which is strange, since they share blood, and she must know, in some sense, what a cataclysm he’s been through. Pam’s pain at the end of season 4 and her quasi break up with Eric are just what she needs to have an impetus for some kind of character growth.
So, yeah - I love their relationship, but I think it would actually ruin what I love about it if it ever got sexual. Fine, if it was in the past, but now? No.
(Source: malevampires, via him-e)
