MovieChat Forums > Let Me In (2010) Discussion > I hope the TV series is based on LMI and...

I hope the TV series is based on LMI and not LtORI

posted 8 years ago by treejam555
17 replies | jump to latest

I hope that the TV show is based on Owen and Abby and not Oskar and Eli.

ELi and Oskar had their happily ever after. Their story is complete. There's no way that a TV series can be faithful to the original with Oskar and Eli as main characters the point of the film and the book was that the two damaged main characters find a measure of happiness together. As a story, happy relationships are boring, As much as I would like to see the further adventures of Oskar and Eli, it wouldn't be compelling television.

Now, a show about Abby would be more interesting because LMI is fundamentally sad. Showing Owen's gradual realization of Abby's true nature would be compelling. Having a TV show with an complete bastard of a vampire would be a breath of fresh air after the whole Twilight-ffad. It'll also be dark and compelling to have a main character as devious and manipulative as Abby who treats humans like cattle.

[–] HarpoSpoke 8 years ago

I can partially agree with your sentiment at least. (how about that??)

I've long felt that any "further adventures of Abby and Owen" would pretty much ruin LMI. The best part about LMI to me was the ability of fans to speculate about the future and write their own ending. Despite your insistence that there is only one interpretation, that isn't true. LMI fans have come up with as many different futures as there are fans practically. (Mine is the boring one....Owen lasts about a week and goes back home) There are "happy endings"...which make no sense to me...the whole point of LMI to me is that being a vampire sucks. How could Owen being turned be a "happy ending"? But...to each their own. A lot of fans like that idea.

So what happens if they were to make a sequel? Only a small number of LMI fans would enjoy it at all. Those who agree with the interpretation would love it while all other fans would hate it. Same thing with the ending of the TV show Dexter. They left it open and anything can happen after that. I think that's the best way to end it and hope they never "finish" Dexter. That way every fan gets the ending they want.

But take heart. I've read a quite a few articles about it today and they stress it's mostly based on the novel over either movie. I saw they are setting it in the US and there might be a Cop character, but they claim they are taking most of it from the novel.

[–] treejam555 8 years ago

(Mine is the boring one....Owen lasts about a week and goes back home)

Ha like Abby would actually let him leave.

How could Owen being turned be a "happy ending"?

It can't. Because Abby is just using him. But Oskar and Eli can be happy because they really love each other. It might be sappy, but the how point of the original movie/novel is that Oskar was ready to leave humanity to be with Eli.

[–] HarpoSpoke 8 years ago

Ha like Abby would actually let him leave.

Not sure what she can do about it. He'll be cold and hungry for a few days. There is no one to take care of Owen during the day and no where for them to stay. He's going to miss those mac and cheese dinners in a hurry. I'm sure Abby can help him find shelter at night, but those days are long and boring for a 12 year old kid. There is no way he would logically stick around very long. I'm again reminded of that guy who broke out of prison in cold weather and just turned himself back in. That's an adult male and he couldn't stand being out in the cold without food. Owen is 12 and frail....did I say a week? Nah...he won't make it that long. He'll either run back home, head for a police station, or die. 😎

Also not sure what "she won't let him leave" is based on since she never acts anything like that in the movie. He was the pursuer, not her.

It can't. Because Abby is just using him. But Oskar and Eli can be happy because they really love each other. It might be sappy, but the how point of the original movie/novel is that Oskar was ready to leave humanity to be with Eli.

I know you've got your interpretation, but you need to support it with something. There isn't anything in LMI to support what you say about Abby.

It fits Eli much better. He is the one who is the "watcher" in LTROI. Eli does it at the beginning of the movie (He points to Oskar's apartment) in the middle of the movie (watching the gym) and the end of the movie (pool scene). He is the one who sits around and watches Oskar almost get drowned before acting...Abby just bursts in and kills everyone. Eli knew exactly who was innocent while Abby knew nothing other than Owen was in danger. There is a reason why Eli knew which one wasn't hurting Oskar.

Eli also demonstrates disdain for Hakan while Abby shows affection for Thomas (she even keeps his picture). More importantly, we know Eli has used a person as a helper with no emotional attachment (in the novel Eli admits there were many of them)...Abby hasn't done that. Neither Thomas nor Owen can be any use to her as a helper when she became attached to them. That's when she is most happy...when they are her age and CAN'T help her. And that situation lasted for years with Thomas. She was the caretaker for him and it would be the same with Owen if he stuck around. Hard to ignore that evidence of her true motivation. Not to mention it makes no sense for a being who doesn't care about humans to live in close proximity to them in the first placer where it is more dangerous. There is only one logical motivation for Abby....companionship.

The novel actually goes to great pains to inform the reader that neither Eli nor Oskar is interested in him being a vampire. There is a reason why JAL had to write an epilogue to reverse that. If it was in the novel he would have just pointed it out.

Not to mention the biggest logical flaw...being a vampire sucks in JAL's universe. It's a curse. That's the main bedrock of the entire story. Both Eli and Abby hate it. So creating another miserable vampire is a "happy ending"? I don't get where that comes from. It's the Twilight influence on culture I guess. Can't believe JAL fell into that trap too.

And the idea that they will somehow be happy if there are two of them is stretching it. Owen would be stuck at 12...and 12 year olds are not logical. He's going to start blaming Abby pretty damn quick when he finds out he is cursed forever. It's hard enough for one vampire to hide...but two? That's twice the body count folks. Try to imagine two 12 year olds getting along for an extended period of time....especially when facing daily problems like that.

I realize we have to ignore a lot of logic in movies, but boy that "happy ending" thing is just a bit much to swallow.

[–] treejam555 8 years ago

He'll either run back home, head for a police station, or die. 😎

Also not sure what "she won't let him leave" is based on since she never acts anything like that in the movie. He was the pursuer, not her.

She'd kill him before she'd let him leave. And given that Owen is 12 and Abby is not...it's quite distasteful to say that he was the pursuer. But this is my point. All of these things deserve to get explored in a series.

I realize we have to ignore a lot of logic in movies, but boy that "happy ending" thing is just a bit much to swallow.

Meh, that's your opinion. You don't know that it'll be twice the body count. Maybe Abby only kills to stop her victims from turning.

[–] HarpoSpoke 8 years ago

She'd kill him before she'd let him leave. And given that Owen is 12 and Abby is not...it's quite distasteful to say that he was the pursuer. But this is my point. All of these things deserve to get explored in a series.

Abby is 12 as well. That's not my opinion, that Matt Reeves' opinion. He even designed the vampire makeup around the idea that Abby is stuck in adolescence.

There are definitely a lot of things from the book they can use. I have no idea how they will approach zombie Haken though...can you imagine?

Meh, that's your opinion. You don't know that it'll be twice the body count. Maybe Abby only kills to stop her victims from turning.

Definitely just my opinion since it's my interpretation. 😀

I just see too many logical holes to buy into any "happy ending" for this story. The main thrust of it to me is the fact that a vampire's existence is portrayed as being so miserable. Two 12 year olds dealing with that life doesn't sound very happy to me.

[–] treejam555 8 years ago

Abby is 12 as well. That's not my opinion, that Matt Reeves' opinion. He even designed the vampire makeup around the idea that Abby is stuck in adolescence.

Abby is physically tweleve, the vampire makeup as a symbol of physical adolescence gone wrong. I don't understand your determination to see Abby as a regular 12 year old. Was Dracula a regular fifty year old man? In fact, name one cinematic vampire who is the same as their physical age.

She is not 12 years old. She is the boss of the Father character, the Father couldn't even spell Abby correctly. In fact his whole note was idiotic, so he was definitely note the brains of the operation. At no point did Reeves or Chloe indicate that Abby was not the hundred year old schemer that her actions show her to be.

[–] Jameron 8 years ago

"She is not 12 years old." - treejam555

"At no point did Reeves or Chloe indicate that Abby was not the hundred year old schemer that her actions show her to be." - treejam555

Apart from sating "I'm twelve, but I've been twelve for a very long time"? Admittedly, if you're sold on the Evil Abby thing, you could claim that she was lying about being twelve, but Eli made the same claim and I don't believe Eli was evil, or lying. So why does it have to be a lie when Abby says it?

A twelve year old can learn how to be safe and stay alive without having to wait until they mature mentally.

.

- - - - - - - - - - -
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0e3tGxnFKfE

http://tinyurl.com/LTROI-story

[–] treejam555 8 years ago

Apart from sating "I'm twelve, but I've been twelve for a very long time"? Admittedly, if you're sold on the Evil Abby thing, you could claim that she was lying about being twelve, but Eli made the same claim and I don't believe Eli was evil, or lying. So why does it have to be a lie when Abby says it?

It's her actions. She killed Thomas, who unlike Hakan, was with her his whole life and truly loved her. Killing him, or allowing the situation to progress to the point where he wanted to die, is an undeniably evil act. That's the difference between Eli and Abby. One killed a drunk pedophille who was with her a few weeks, the other killed a lifelong friend: their reaction was pretty much the same, so I can only presume that love means nothing to Abby, therefore, Abby isn't emotionally twelve, or maybe she's a very twisted 12 year old, which really doesn't matter, she's evil either way. And that character is worth exploring further.

[–] Jameron 8 years ago

"Thomas, who unlike Hakan, was with her his whole life and truly loved her. Killing him, or allowing the situation to progress to the point where he wanted to die, is an undeniably evil act" - treejam555

Yes, Thomas truly loved Abby, and Abby still had emotions for Thomas although I doubt it was still full blown love any more. The pain and hurt is writ large on Abby's face in that scene, she didn't just kill Thomas, he offered her his life and she reluctantly granted his final wish.

Twelve year olds can't be blamed for situations running adrift over decades, that's why we don't let them make important decisions, they're not up to it. Abby had no real control over their future lives.

"One killed a drunk pedophille who was with her a few weeks, the other killed a lifelong friend: their reaction was pretty much the same, so I can only presume that love means nothing to Abby, therefore, Abby isn't emotionally twelve, or maybe she's a very twisted 12 year old, which really doesn't matter, she's evil either way" - treejam555

Their reaction was not the same, Abby exhibited much more emotion than Eli.

"And that character is worth exploring further." - treejam555

I agree that an evil manipulating predator would be a great character, but that isn't Abby.

.

- - - - - - - - - - -
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0e3tGxnFKfE

http://tinyurl.com/LTROI-story

[–] treejam555 8 years ago

Yes, Thomas truly loved Abby, and Abby still had emotions for Thomas although I doubt it was still full blown love any more. The pain and hurt is writ large on Abby's face in that scene, she didn't just kill Thomas, he offered her his life and she reluctantly granted his final wish.

Twelve year olds can't be blamed for situations running adrift over decades, that's why we don't let them make important decisions, they're not up to it. Abby had no real control over their future lives.

Eh, I didn't see that. Let me put it another way, if Eli decided not to turn Oskar and Oskar stayed with her for forty or so years and then got captured, would Eli "reluctantly grant his final wish" and get in bed with another boy? Or would she raise hell at the hospital and rampage at the pain of it all, or maybe carry Oskar off to watch a sunrise together? LMI promotes the cycle theory. The cycle is evil. To me the only question that could even be remotely debatable is whether Abby is the author of the cycle or just a passively being swept along in it. She's evil either way, but her being the mastermind at least gives her some kind of agency in the story, which is more interesting to me.

And you're assuming Abby is 12. I'm arguing that she mentally isn't. A big part of the reason we don't hold 12 year olds responsible is because most of the time, they have neither the power nor know any better to be "up to it." Abby the vampire has both the power and the experience. She is more in control of their lives than Thomas or Owen was. And she choose to lead them down the path of destruction. That's evil. Evil isn't just a black cape or a masterplan, it's also repeatedly ruining lives for your own gain. It's sending a loved one out to die for your over and over again. It's willingly granting that "final wish" to the people who are used up and broken while claiming love. Eli does none of these things, only Abby.

To step away from this a little bit, LtROI was very tightly plotted and directed, (give or take a cat scene.) Every scene with Eli and Oskar and Hakan says something about their character and their relationship. The balance is why despite all of the murdering, the central relationship can be innocent and happy. LMI changed this by focusing on Thomas-which isn't bad, per se-but it needs its own balance. LMI demands Abby to be evil because there's history between her and Thomas to consider now. If Eli killing Hakan was the equivalent of firing an employee, Abby killing THomas is her throwing out an aging loving parent into the streets. That has moral weight, no matter what the circumstances.

[–] Jameron 8 years ago

"Let me put it another way, if Eli decided not to turn Oskar and Oskar stayed with her for forty or so years and then got captured, would Eli "reluctantly grant his final wish" and get in bed with another boy? Or would she raise hell at the hospital and rampage at the pain of it all, or maybe carry Oskar off to watch a sunrise together?" - treejam555

Well, you're comparing apples and oranges, or rather ... apples and an unknown fruit.

We know that Abby is not as strongly connected to Thomas as she once might have been. There is still some measure of affection but not the passion that you might want to see, that you believe Eli would retain for Oskar. If we consider the history of both Abby and Eli, as implied in their respective films; Eli is breaking a cycle, where it is heavily implied that Abby is continuing a cycle.

If Abby has done this before there is a high probability that she has come to regard the passing of her companions as an unavoidable consequence of making friends in the first place. Make friends, they get old and die, get lonely, make new friends. Admittedly, this time there is an overlap which was likely instrumental in Thomas' downfall. We have all lost touch with people as we go through life, but does it ever occur to us to not make any new friends because we'll inevitably fail at being friends forever?

In Eli's case, we don't know if his relationship with Oskar would be the same as when they left Blackeberg, but let us assume it is. Picture Eli perched on Oskar's hospital window ledge, circa 2022, his love for Oskar is as strong as ever, his life, his reason for continuing is on the other side of the glass, dying. His fear for what the future holds for him, the loneliness, the pointlessness, the soul destroying emptiness, is all consuming. This would be Eli's first time of facing the loss of someone he loves, his emotions would be raw, painful, and he would rail against the injustice of it all. Of course Eli would react differently to Abby, but both are acting according to their circumstances.

" LMI promotes the cycle theory. The cycle is evil. To me the only question that could even be remotely debatable is whether Abby is the author of the cycle or just a passively being swept along in it. She's evil either way, but her being the mastermind at least gives her some kind of agency in the story, which is more interesting to me." - treejam555

If Abby is being swept along with the tide of events then she is just as much a victim as those around her.

"And you're assuming Abby is 12. I'm arguing that she mentally isn't." - treejam555

No, I'm not assuming she's twelve. The film tells us she's mentally twelve.

"Abby the vampire has both the power and the experience. She is more in control of their lives than Thomas or Owen was. And she choose to lead them down the path of destruction." - treejam555

She doesn't have any real power. The only "power" she has is that she can maybe influence other people, just like everyone else can. Both films left out "the glamour" as part of a vampire's arsenal.

"Evil isn't just a black cape or a masterplan, it's also repeatedly ruining lives for your own gain. It's sending a loved one out to die for your over and over again. It's willingly granting that "final wish" to the people who are used up and broken while claiming love." - treejam555

I'd say Evil is more like intentionally ruining lives. Repeating the same mistake is something people are capable of without any malice aforethought.

"It's willingly granting that "final wish" to the people who are used up and broken while claiming love." - treejam555

How about reluctantly granting that wish?

"LMI demands Abby to be evil because there's history between her and Thomas to consider now." - treejam555

Surely Thomas and Abby's past turns this story into a tragedy, if one believes that Owen faces the same fate as Thomas?

"If Eli killing Hakan was the equivalent of firing an employee, Abby killing THomas is her throwing out an aging loving parent into the streets. That has moral weight, no matter what the circumstances." - treejam555

The "martyr" is a staple in action films, religious stories, romance films, and many other media. Thomas martyring himself is far away from aged relatives being doomed against their will.

.

- - - - - - - - - - -
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0e3tGxnFKfE

http://tinyurl.com/LTROI-story

[–] HarpoSpoke 8 years ago

Abby is physically tweleve, the vampire makeup as a symbol of physical adolescence gone wrong. I don't understand your determination to see Abby as a regular 12 year old. Was Dracula a regular fifty year old man? In fact, name one cinematic vampire who is the same as their physical age.

She is not 12 years old. She is the boss of the Father character, the Father couldn't even spell Abby correctly. In fact his whole note was idiotic, so he was definitely note the brains of the operation. At no point did Reeves or Chloe indicate that Abby was not the hundred year old schemer that her actions show her to be.

I see her that way because that's what Reeves said. He makes it very clear in several interviews that Abby is mentally 12. You've even posted one of them yourself so you really can't say you don't know what Reeves says about Abby:

She needs to survive, and she does need help. In the book, I don't get the sense that she's a 12-year-old who has a 250-year-old woman inside of her who's like a schemer. Rather, she's someone who was attacked 250 years ago and so was stuck internally at the age of 12. She's stuck in that level of emotional development. She never really got past that. There's something sad about that idea she'd never fully mature, even her emotion and brain would not go past that point. She learned how to be a survivor and get by, but she's still vulnerable in the way that a kid is vulnerable. She can't control these things. I thought that was a great metaphor for adolescence, when your body starts to change and things are out of control. It's evident in the way we depicted her. She didn't have fangs. The idea is similar to how your teeth go crazy after you lose your baby teeth. We made those teeth look like adolescence gone wrong. Her skin has lots of acne. All of that was an attempt to show the state she's in. She has levels of evil, but she's also human. To me, that's what makes the story so provocative. The end of the movie is chilling, but it's also like the horror version of The Graduate. Boy gets girl. There they are together. There is a part of you that wants them to be together, but the big question is, "Now what?" That's the cool thing about the story. I don't like to wage one over the other. I like the gray, ambiguous mix of it all.

http://www.artistdirect.com/entertainment-news/article/let-me-in-director-matt-reeves-talks-technique-satan-and-taxi-driver/7638540#s2YBj6BuyhXIWvlj.99

And:
To develop Owen's vampire friend Abby (the US equivalent of the original's Eli), he used a series of Mary Ellen Mark photographs of a family of vagabonds called the Damm family as inspiration not only for her look, but also for the way he wanted Kick-Ass star Chloe Moretz to play her. "A lot of these pictures had this girl, who was about 12, at the centre of them," Reeves elaborates. "She had this very defiant look, but you could see she was really wounded under it. She was 12, but she'd been through things that no 12-year-old should ever have to go through, and the burden of that seemed to be something that was coming through very powerfully in those pictures. When I showed them to Chloe during her audition she started playing the character differently. She was immediately able to play that sense of burden, and that vulnerability and that toughness that to me was very critical."

Here is the photo Reeves used to show Moretz how to play Abby:
http://www.maryellenmark.com/images/300px_s/210K-116-010.JPEG

“You know I never would have guessed I would be making science fiction and horror films. That kind of stuff. They were the kind of movies that frankly as a kid scared the hell out of me and so I really had a hard time watching them… I never thought I would be making them and then after Cloverfield happened it obviously created a lot of opportunity for me to do those kind of films. I discovered the fun of genre is…you get to explore your fears and you get to use the metaphor of the genre – whether it’s a giant monster or a… 12-year-old vampire. Whatever it is you can sink something underneath the surface and make a personal film under the guise of great fun romp.”
http://collider.com/matt-reeves-the-passage-this-dark-endeavor/

Or how about the actress who played Abby? Her take is pretty important too:

Abby has so many dimensions to her. She's a vampire so she's 300 years old, but she still is a little girl. And she is a vampire but she doesn't want to be a vampire.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qcvXPsxXLWE&feature=related

Moretz also refers to LMI as a "Love story" about "young love" too (Matt agrees with her). Matt explains that "The thing I tried to do was actually let them guide me. Because you're trying to make a movie about what you remember what it was like being 12, but Chloe was 12..Kodi was 12 and they would sort of show me":

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xtcUrSRTMDg

Here Reeves goes into the photo that Abby was based on and makes it very clear that she is "she's still emotionally 12":

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S9-NI-TFlAs

So I can name at least one cinematic vampire who is the same as their physical age...Abby. (I guess from that statement you accept Alfredson's version of Eli's mental age)

Also worth noting Reeves in several of these interviews stresses that it is up to the audience to decide the motivations. He flat refused to state any interpretation as a fact every time he is asked about it.

[–] treejam555 8 years ago

meh that's interesting and all, but it didn't make it onto film. Plus Reeves has lost all credibility the moment he said that LMI was less a remake and more based on the novel and the two films are only similar insofar as there are only a few ways to tell the same story. So as far as I'm concerned, Reeves could have easily made it so that Abby was emotionally twelve if he really wished, but what he ended up doing was much closer to cold-blooded manipulator than poor 12 year old girl.

[–] HarpoSpoke 8 years ago

meh that's interesting and all, but it didn't make it onto film. Plus Reeves has lost all credibility the moment he said that LMI was less a remake and more based on the novel and the two films are only similar insofar as there are only a few ways to tell the same story. So as far as I'm concerned, Reeves could have easily made it so that Abby was emotionally twelve if he really wished, but what he ended up doing was much closer to cold-blooded manipulator than poor 12 year old girl.

Well that is another thing you have to ignore to make your theory work, so I guess you do need to dismiss everything Reeves and Moretz say about the character. 😉

[–] HarpoSpoke 8 years ago

Plus Reeves has lost all credibility the moment he said that LMI was less a remake and more based on the novel and the two films are only similar insofar as there are only a few ways to tell the same story.

Oh by the way, Reeves has never said that. I know a lot of LTROI fans claim that's what he says, but then you read the quotes and that isn't actually what he says. If you can find a quote I haven't seen, I would love to see it.

[–] 8 years ago

[deleted]

[–] SirKhanRamboDubuc 7 years ago

It's a sequence of random images.

So what I'm making out from the comparison of the two films is that gay couples will always be much happier than a man and a woman. Meh. It's okay.