On Gabriela´s role moving forward- Heavy theory and plenty book spoilers
So, I´ve been watching and rewatching the 2 chapter and I´m honing in on Gabriela over and over again. There´s a lot of details that make mego into heavy theory mode so bear with me as I explain some stuff I´ve been noticing, both from words and phrases here and there and certain visuals I´ve noticed.
VISUAL CUES
Gabriella being looked over by a \"godlike\" figure on the corner
Lestat being looked over by a Dragon with a muzzle? chain?
He says this while looking at her directly
So first I started noticing these little details in the pictures, by themselves they don´t seem like a lot, but then...
SUSPICIOUS PHRASES
This is where it get´s weird for me, Gabriella mentions the Great Conversion quite casually and mentions one of the woman at the strip club with predatory instint would be a great candidate for it. Thing is, we don´t know exactly who or what is "behind" this Great Conversion yet, but she seems to know a lot about it. After this she immediatly deflects Lestat attention back to the hunt when he´s about to ask her about it.
My second red flag (so to speak) comes from the shift of her character from the book to the show, she seems more focused here on certain things and a lot more likely to dodge a question whenever Lestat asks where she´s been or what she´s been doing
She wasn´t in Chicago and says she was in Húsavik, after this she deflect the question again
INDIRECT CONTROL
There are 3 times Gabriella heavily implies something to Lestat that he ends up doing, either because he feels the pressure, because she´s living vicariously through him or because of their enmeshment for all their lives.
1- The wolves. Gabriella goads Lestat (by his own admission) either to die or go where the others won´t and she cannot, he always acts as an extension of her, look at how he´s already loading his gun even before she screams and he reacts
He jumps to it as soon as she says that too
2- Hunting in the Hotel. Distracting Lestat to take his blood and skirt around their "deal". He then doubts about killing the man when he mentions his family but she wouldn´t stop for it. Look at his face when he realizes she has no such moral question. He does it/lets her do it anyways
3- The family slaughter. The restaurant scene is key, he reminisces about her turning and killing their family. And yet, as he realizes what he´s done there is regret for following her along so easily, regret she clearly doesn´t feel. We also see in the restaurant scene Lestat looking dejectedly at all the slaughter there, as if it´s meaningless (plus look closely when they are next to the piano with her head on his shoulder an the next frame she´s not even there, it´s a very fast edit but I think very relevant with how he´s telling the story)
She sleeps soundly, he regrets it
Lights and angles changing constantly as well
Even better, remember the scene with the wolves when he says "I wanted the wolves to come, until they did" and his speech after where he said all those things about dreaming of killing his family? Well, it seems that happened twice when he was the "wolf" in the figurative speech this time.
So we got a series of 3 moments similar to Daniel asking him 3 times if he stuttered in the last episode, only for it to be confirmed indirectly on this one by his own recollection, perhaps he´ll accept what Gabriela makes him do as well (eventually).
And here´s my batshit theory for the season, either Akasha is working through Gabriella or Gabriella is part of the plan. The statue over her left shoulder gave me the creeps on that one scene, like something else looking at her from "beyond and above". We know Akasha was drifting when she slept, looking at the world thorough everyone´s eyes when she could. We also have soo many teases about the Body thief plotline that I cannot ignore it just yet. Maybe it will be literal, maybe it´s more a general theme than an actual Body switch, control, either way Gabriella´s hold on Lestat will have devastating consecuences mooving forward.
So, Gabriella for me is either directly taking orders from Akasha (or without knowing, through the Great Conversion), serving as a vessel for her for some reason or simply the thematic reason why Akasha´s hold on Lestat will be so strong, he´s literally been conditioned to follow the older woman with power over him all of his life (mortal and immortal), so either of those history beats could perfectly work with what we´ve seen so far.
Waaaay more crazy theory: One little super small bit we´ve seen from Akasha is making me believe Marius is keeping her asleep rather than her being just still, that little scene of him leaving a little tool next to her hand we´ve seen from teasers. Now if it´s any sort of disabling tool (say like a lobotomy tool or mummification one which I haven´t found a reference to) then that´s insane. I have nothing to go on other than a frame and a pipe dream, but here it is:
Maybe things won´t be as crazy as all that but I am enjoying the season so far and Gabriella in particular seems to have some changes added on purpose for the chosen media vs the book. This is either to reflect Lestat´s personality being shaped the way it is by a more toxic relationship than what´s been presented on the book or my theory is true and she´s in Akasha´s plan from the beginning (then it makes more sense to me to do all those changes, knowing what Akasha´s plan is) but we´ll see in the future. Maybe she´s being used to release her because Lestat woke her once and she sees this as the only way she can rise again, who knows.
Anyways, that was my rambling for today, hope you enjoyed!!!!
If I´m wrong forget everything you just read 🤣
Posted Jun 16, 2026, 3:55 AM UTC