YMMV / Carmilla the Series

• Actor Shipping:
  • There's a strong following for Laura and Carmilla's actresses, Elise Bauman and Natasha Negovanlis, AKA, Negovanman. "Natlise" has also been used.
  • Annie Briggs (Perry) and Sophia Walker (Mattie) also have a ship name — Wriggs.
• Adaptation Displacement: Go on FanFiction.Net, you see Carmilla fanfiction under the book archive, but all the stories are aimed at this web series.
• Alternate Character Interpretation:
  • Are Laura and the others (Carmilla, Perry and LaFontaine) who fled Silas at the end of Season 1 a bunch of Cowardly Lions who can be viewed as the Designated Hero? Or are they the only sane people there for trying to escape while an eldritch abomination was breaking free?
    On the one hand, while obviously not the bad guys, they up and abandon Silas when a literal Hellmouth opens because of their actions, only returning after much hardship only for a gnoll in a mountain to bring them "home" again. She also doesn't acknowledge the fact that the Summer Society, Alchemy Club, and Zetas actually stayed and helped to try and provide for or protect the simple, average students having no idea on what the hell is going on.
    On the other, the group had just been finished dealing with the already mighty forces the Light and Carmilla's mother provided, part of which involved Carmilla, the badass vampire, very nearly dying. It's hard to think of a way they could have fought against said Hellmouth when dealing with just a fraction of it was so difficult, and they had no way of knowing that the abomination inside would get stuck coming out. Laura is genuinely remorseful about the state that everything is in, and her first response upon learning about the power struggle is to try and get some genuine authority involved. When that fails, she resolves to help fix everything, despite all the crap she'd endured from the start of Season 1 and after. Also, the Zetas, Summers, and the Alchemy Club are so focused on fighting for territory that they aren't actually doing much good.
  • On a lighter note, debate rages on in the fandom as to what the characters' specific sexual orientations are. In particular, whether Danny's a lesbian or not. (This tends to come up whenever her possible Ship Tease with Kirsch is discussed.) Tweets from the in-character twitters of Laura and Carmilla about how Danny doesn't swing Kirsch's way or that he isn't her type, as well as it eventually being revealed that she doesn't return his feelings at all seem to point to her being gay. (Though some fans say that until they hear it from Danny's mouth, her being bisexual isn't out of the question.)
• Angst? What Angst?: One of the main criticisms of the finale is that Perry and LaFontaine both seem rather blase about Perry having been possessed for months on end, the world nearly ending, and Laura dying. (She comes back, but still.)
• Base-Breaking Character: Almost every major character.
  • Laura in particular gets it the worst. To some, she's a sweet, brave, determined hero who only wants what's best for everyone. Others tend to view her as a selfish brat who abuses Carmilla.
  • Carmilla herself is either viewed as a romantic Jerk with a Heart of Gold who is a good person deep down, or an unrepentant murderer who doesn't have it in her to care about anyone but herself and whoever she's currently dating (and Mattie). Related to the above, some find it a bit rich that she calls Laura a "selfish, callow girl" when Carmilla could be viewed as being incredibly self-centered herself.
  • Danny — brave hero and selfless martyr, or pushy, creepy Clingy Jealous Girl who can't take a hint?
  • Is Kirsh just a douchebag frat boy with no respect for women, or is he more misguided but well-meaning? This died down a bit after Season 2, when the show itself began to lean towards the latter.
• Broken Base: After the Season 3 finale, the fandom became split into those who liked Laura's redeeming Inanna (aka, the Dean), or those who found it ridiculous. Most people agree Annie Briggs and Elise Bauman's acting was good enough to pull it off, though, even if one does find it to be a bit contrived.
  • Even more so between those who liked the dean making Carmilla human again and those who didn't.
• Complete Monster:
  • Season 2: Baron Vordenberg is a member of the Silas Board of Directors, introduced as a kind, helpful old man, despite his disdain for vampires. Once Laura gets him voted as the Chairman of the Board, Vordenberg immediately shows his true colors by ordering a detainment of all vampires and anything supernatural in Silas University. Vordenberg has some students, including Laura's friend Danny, recruited into his militia, and preaches anti-vampire propaganda. Ignoring the threat of a gate to Hell opening, Vordenberg has Lophiiformes killed, all to make a name for himself. He then intends to execute Carmilla and Mattie, along with any students protecting vampires; the attempted arrest leads to Mattie's death, which he takes credit for. After Laura starts a resistance against him, Vordenberg has Theo betray them and kill Danny. He has the other board members shot before preparing to behead Carmilla, in front of Laura and their friends, taunting them all to their faces while doing so. Despite his doddering demeanor, Vordenberg is far more dangerous than meets the eye, with his claims of heroism being lies he tells to fuel his ego, and live out his fantasies of personal glory.
  • Seasons 2-3: Theo Straka starts out as an passive, if arrogant, acting leader of Zeta Omega Mu, with an open disdain for the Summers and Kirsch. When Vordenberg takes control of Silas, Theo becomes a supportive soldier of the regime, helping with the detainment of supernatural residents and their allies. When Theo seemingly offers to help the resistance with Mel, he betrays them when Vordenberg offers Theo a deal to be his second-in-command. Theo stabs Danny before her helpless friends, smugly watching as she bleeds out. Following Vordenberg's death, Theo becomes the new representative of the Corvae Corporation, working directly under the Dean—the goddess Inanna—in her plot to bring about Hell on Earth, only caring that he's in a position of power. Theo oversees the slavery of students in digging the gates of Hell, putting them through deadly and hazardous conditions, expecting his "brothers" to work under his authority. When a Summer sister makes a deal to benefit the others, Theo has her hang from her wrists above the first five gates, planning to drop her in.
• Crosses the Line Twice: In the outtakes for Season 3, we find out what, exactly, the Dean said during her capture that was apparently bad enough to make Laura spit out her food in disgust. Annie Briggs was simply instructed to say "something gross," so what was the first thing she came up with? "I gave Lola Perry a venereal disease." Elise Bauman just about chokes on her food, and everyone either cracks up or lets out a Collective Groan.
  Annie: Too much?
• Die for Our Ship:
  • Laura, Danny, Kirsch and Carmilla all tend to get it from separate ends of the fandom. Thankfully, just a Vocal Minority.
  • Mostly averted in regards to JP. Even those who hate LaFlashdrive with a passion (usually diehard LaFerry shippers) find JP too darn nice to hate.
• Draco in Leather Pants: While Carmilla is by no means a villain, and certainly seems to have more of a moral compass than other vampires in the series, the fandom can frequently forget that she's "not the hero of this piece," and can go to far in woobifying her. Most interestingly is that for the first half of Season 2, Laura seems to give her this treatment in-universe, which ends up causing problems for them and eventually leads to their breakup. Mattie gets this treatment, too. A rather annoyingly large portion of the fanbase refuses to blame Mattie or Carmilla for anything, even when they're clearly at fault, or acknowledge their flaws.
  • Worth noting that Carmilla also literally wears leather pants.
• Ensemble Dark Horse:
  • J.P., for his niceness despite his rather unfortunate circumstances, and just being kind of adorable. This only increased after he got an actual body.
  • LaFontaine is probably the most popular character other than Carmilla and Laura themselves.
  • Kirsch, for being a lovable dumbass.
  • Mattie, for being another cool vampire, Affably Evil, and incredibly beautiful.
  • Papa Hollis manages to be beloved by most of the fandom despite never appearing onscreen for the first two seasons. When it was announced he'd be in Season 3, the fandom went insane. When he did appear, he immediately won most viewers over by proving he can hold his own against vampires, turning out to be hilarious, and being remarkably open-minded and accepting all in his first two episodes.
  • The Dean, in a Love to Hate kind of way.
  • Mel became this after being rescued. It helps that she's one of the few characters that's not constantly blinded by love, panic, or thirst for power, and is one of the only people in the Pit trying to do something about the Dean's plans.
• Fandom-Enraging Misconception: DON'T REFER TO LAFONTAINE WITH FEMALE PRONOUNS. Calling them "Susan" is also a no-no, unless you're referring to them when they were still willingly going by that name, before they transitioned.
• Fan Nickname: Tiny Gay Laura, Tall Gay Danny, Broody Gay Carmilla, Useless Lesbian Vampire Carmilla. "Dimwit Squad" for the entire crew.
• Fanon:
  • In the first season, Kirsch's first name being Brody and Will's last name being Eisen. Both were Jossed.
  • It's almost universally agreed in the fandom that Laura's mother abandoned her and her father.
• Fan-Preferred Couple: In the first season and the beginning of the second, LaFerry was almost universally preferred to the canon LaFlashdrive. However, as the second season went on, giving J.P. more personality and the introduction of Mattie, and thus, the very popular ship Permonde, more people are shipping LaFlashdrive than before, usually putting Perry with Mattie instead.
• Fourth Wall Myopia: The section of the fandom that tends to bash Laura for disliking and distrusting Mattie tends to fall under this. We know that Mattie (probably) didn't kill the newspaper kids, being well-versed in genre conventions and tropes and knowing that Mattie is a textbook Red Herring. and to us, she seems like a pretty cool, if morally ambiguous character. So, to the audience, it's rather obvious that Mattie isn't the culprit. Laura, however, has no reason to believe that. Between Mattie threatening to murder Laura the first time they met, attacking and nearly killing Perry in a fit of rage, and openly admitting to killing other people, from Laura's point of view, of course Mattie's the prime suspect. In any real life murder investigation, Mattie would be arrested straight away.
• Fridge Brilliance: The reveal that Kirsh's first name is "Wilson" suddenly throws a new light on his previous friendship with Will; considering what he's like, you can expect him to go up to him going "dude we are both Wills isn't that awesome?!".
• Harsher in Hindsight: Kirsch comparing himself and Danny to Romeo and Juliet, clearly not knowing how the story ends, was quite funny. Not so much now that Danny's dead.
• He Really Can Act: Not that Annie Briggs didn't get praise for her performance as Perry before, of course, but her performance as the Dean is stunning.
• I Knew It!: Most of the fandom had called Perry being possessed by the Dean by about halfway through Season 2.
• Incest Yay Shipping: There is a following for Mattie/Carmilla. They're Not Blood Siblings, but they consider themselves sisters, and they were sired by the same vampire "mother," so it still counts as incest by most people's standards.
• It Was His Sled: Good luck finding someone who even has a casual knowledge of the show that doesn't know Perry is being possessed by the Dean.
• Jerkass Woobie:
  • Carmilla. True, she's a snarky, cynical Jerkass, but considering all the shit she's been put through in her 300+ years of undeath, including watching her first love betray her after being convinced that she was a monster, being locked in a coffin under the earth for 80 years, and be forced to betray and send young girls to an unknown and almost certainly horrific fate, she's certainly earned the right to it. In fact, Laura believes this of her in-universe.
  Laura: I just feel sorry for her, is all. I mean, the way her mom treats her, it's no wonder she has baggage.
  • Also her sister, Mattie. Even though Mattie's definitely not a nice person, having casually alluded to killing people for fun, and threatening Laura and co. at every turn, she's still likable, and most viewers shed a little tear for her when she died in Carmilla's arms. This is also helped when you consider that she was presumably put through similar abuse by the Dean as Carmilla was.
• Late-Arrival Spoiler: The Dean is possessing Perry. This is one of the most talked-about aspects of the second season by the fandom, and it quickly became It Was His Sled within a week of the season finale. The third season trailer doesn't even try to hide it. For that matter, the Dean being evil, Laura/Carmilla being the Official Couple and Carmilla surviving the events of the ending of Season 1 qualify, too.
• Les Yay:
  • Perry and LaFontaine have enormous amounts of subtext to go along with the canon lesbian Love Triangle. Although Laf being non-binary makes it uncertain if it qualifies as Les Yay.
  • Mattie and Perry tend to get awfully close in some episodes. Becomes Incest Subtext in a way when a few of their moments were likely when the Dean was out and not Perry.
• Love to Hate: The Baron and especially the Dean.
• Magnificent Bastard: Matska "Mattie" Belmonde is Carmilla's catty but loving adoptive sister and a representative of the Corvae Corporation, and initial chairman of the Silas Board. Taking over Silas in the wake of her mother's death, she does what she can to suppress Laura's coverage of events or put a positive spin on them. It was soon discovered she plans on setting off an explosion to bury Loppiformes as a pragmatic solution to her mother's operations. When Vordenberg becomes too much of a threat, Mattie drinks Lopphi's blood to become more powerful against him. Despite her initial failures and death, her spirit returns as a servant of Ereshkigal, and helps aid the downfall of her mother. Correctly guessing how her mother's plans would fail, she appears again to taunt her over her failure, and a final time to grant Laura her life back if Carmilla could answer a riddle; one Mattie makes easy to guess out of compassion.
• Memetic Badass: Elsie, despite being only briefly at the beginning (as Carmilla's 'study buddy') and end (after being rescued by the Dimwit Squad) of Season 1. The production crew took this and ran with it, creating Hyperswag: The Elsie Chronicles and its sequel, Help Me Swag: The Elsie Chronicles.
• Mind Game Ship:
  • The Dean/Carmilla. And the Dean/Laura. And the Dean/Perry. Especially the latter, considering the Dean has been possessing her. Actually, the Dean/Anyone.
  • Mattie/Perry tends to be this in fanfic, too. Whether it's Mattie or Perry playing the mind games depends on whether it's actual Perry or "Perry" while the Dean is controlling her body.
• Narm: The expressions Kirsch and LaFontaine make when they are temporarily possessed are just too goofy to take seriously during an intense moment.
• Narm Charm:
  • When Carmilla recounts her backstory from the novel to Laura in Episode 16, she frequently interjects with hokey asides using sock puppets. Sure it's silly, but it does serve to take the edge out of the trap of many monologues for being too serious. As it is, it provides a few laughs while Natasha Negovanlis' genuinely engaging acting sells the scene. Thankfully, Laura herself stops the act when she realizes how serious she's being.
  • When Will punches Carmilla for messing with her mother's orders, it looks about as good as you'd expect on a show with such a small budget. The drama is solid enough when combined with the fact that the viewer's likely used to the show's minimalism on one set that more than a few were willing to take it at face value, as many a YouTube comment can attest.
  • The Season 3 finale is, if you think about it too hard, utterly ridiculous. How does Laura keep living (and monologue-ing) for a good ten minutes after her heart gets ripped out? Did she really save the world with a hug? Wasn't it all a bit too convenient in the end for Carm and Laura? However, it's very well-acted, and most people are too happy to see Hollstein alive and happy to care, snarking aside.
• Not-So-Harmless Villain: Baron Vordenberg following the debate. Of course, he's only accomplished this because the Dean allowed it, and once his purpose is fulfilled, he is almost casually dispatched.
• One True Threesome:
  • Plenty of fans Take a Third Option on the Ship-to-Ship Combat by shipping Danny/Laura/Carmilla together.
  • And now JP/Perry/LaFontaine is gaining some steam. Especially after their group hug in 2x19.
• Portmanteau Couple Name: With the last names.
  • Laura/Carmilla: Hollstein
  • Laura/Danny: Hollence
  • Danny/Carmilla: Lawstein
  • Laura/Danny/Carmilla: Hollenstein
  • LaFontaine/Perry: LaFerry
  • LaFontaine/Laura: LaHollis
  • LaFontaine/J-P: It's a bit of a toss-up between "Armitaine" and "LaFlashdrive," but the latter seems more popular on Tumblr.
  • Danny/Mattie: Belence
  • JP/Carmilla: Armistein or Karnage. (This one's almost exclusively restricted to platonic shipping, though.)
  • JP/LaFontaine/Perry: LaFlerry or LaFlasherry. LaFerry Family is also popular.
  • Danny/Betty: Lawdorf (Which the fandom took and ran with, since calling the two tallest women on the show dwarfs appealed to everyone)
  • Perry/Mattie: Permonde
  • Mattie/Carmilla: Belstein (Yes, it exists.)
• Rescued from the Scrappy Heap: Mel's evident horror at Danny's death, and admitting that despite the fact the two of them didn't see eye to eye didn't take away the fact she was a Summer has won some people over. Season 0 managed to turn around the opinions of the rest.
• Rewatch Bonus: Many Perry scenes that may have seemed odd or even unlike the character now makes perfect sense when you go back and watch it with the knowledge in your mind that in certain episodes, the Dean is in control of her body.
• Ron the Death Eater: Related to Draco in Leather Pants, detailed above. A large chunk of the fandom seems dead-set on making Carmilla out to be an entirely blameless Woobie, while portraying Laura as a selfish, abusive girlfriend. In spite of the fact that Laura generally means well and all the problems she causes are entirely accidental, and many of the actions she's hated for are things most people would've done (or thought about doing) in similar circumstances. Especially annoying when the very thing they seem to hate Laura for is simply having normal, human flaws. (Even after some complaints in the first season that Laura wasn't realistically flawed enough.)
• The Scrappy:
  • Mel is disliked by near everyone which isn't a surprise given that her character is a huge Jerkass who doesn't offer any kind of help to the group, actively hunted Carmilla when the Baron gave the order to, dislikes Danny for her friendship with Kirsch and loathes Kirsch to the point of aiming an arrow at him with the intent to kill. Not to mention it took until the penultimate episode of the season to show her in a new light. That said, that one moment rescued her in the eyes of a lot of the fandom, and most agreed that there was hope for Mel after all. Season 0 finished the job, and Mel's now decently well-liked in the fandom, or at the very least tolerated.
  • Theo, essentially Mel's Zeta counterpart, hasn't fared much better, due to his constant disrespect towards Danny and Laura, and how nasty he is to Kirsch. (Calling him a moron, mocking his crush on Danny, saying he's the worst brother the Zetas have ever seen, etc.) After he went back on his deal with Laura and the Summers, and quite literally backstabbed Danny, killing her, without a hint of remorse at that, he went from being hated to loathed by the fandom.
• Ship Mates:
  • Hollstein, LaFerry, and Zeta Society are the most common ships to appear side-by-side in fanfic.
  • Permonde and LaFlashdrive shippers tend to get along, too.
  • Ditto for Lawstein and Hollence shippers.
• Ship-to-Ship Combat: Oh, boy...
  • Hollence vs. Hollstein. (Hollenstein being a alternative option.)
  • Hollence and Hollenstein vs. Zeta Society
  • LaFerry vs. LaFlashdrive.
• Ships That Pass in the Night: Mattie/Danny is surprisingly popular.
• Spoiled by the Format: Any tension that might have been felt regarding Laura's apparent death in the Season 3 finale was instantly banished by the fact the Carmilla Movie trailer had already been released, showing her alive and well.
• The Un-Twist:
  • Carmilla is a vampire! LaFontaine does some lampshading and Leaning on the Fourth Wall about this, saying "we all knew".
  • And in Season 2, it's pretty obvious that the swanky mansion with a network of secret passages isn't really for "visiting professors". Which LaFontaine also called.
  • When it was finally revealed for sure that Mattie really was innocent and didn't kill the newspaper staff, the vast majority of the fandom's reaction was, "Well, duh." Unfortunate side effect of having a fandom that's very used to Red Herrings in murder mysteries.
  • People were calling the fact that Perry's being possessed by the Dean since the previews for the second season came out. As the season went on, more and more people began to agree with the theory. By the time we were halfway through the season, about 95% of the fandom was on board. Most of the few people that weren't on board said it was because they felt it was too obvious and thought the writers must've been faking us out. Then The Reveal came in the finale. Cue cries of I Knew It! erupting from all sides.
• Wangst: A lot of people have had this reaction to Danny in Season 3, especially her claims that no one cared when she died, when this is blatantly untrue. As one creampuff put it, she says this as she's draining Kirsch's blood. You know, the guy that snuck her body off the pyre so she could be resurrected. That said, it's implied that the Dean may be brainwashing her and she doesn't know Kirsch did that.
• The Woobie: Almost everybody, at one point or another.
  • Perry in particular will break your heart. She just wants everyone to be safe and happy, but is constantly surrounded by supernatural horrors that she's not really qualified to deal with. She sticks around for the sake of her friends, but she's a Nervous Wreck most of the time. Oh, and now she's possessed. Season 0 really cranks up the sympathy factor for her, giving some insight for why she's so afraid of the supernatural.
  • Laura, come the end of Season 2. Danny's death sends her hurdling over the Despair Event Horizon, and it just gets worse in the last episode of the season. She lost everything trying to protect everyone and make the school a better place, and was forced to go against her own principles and kill somebody in cold blood to save the love of her life. In the finale, she's completely traumatized from what's happened, and it's only Carmilla that can keep her from shutting down completely.
  • Kirsch is also pretty pitiable at the end of the second season. He was told he could resurrect Danny, his friend and the girl he loved. Good-natured fool that he is, he doesn't question this, and does what "Perry" tells him to do, not realizing it's actually the Dean in Perry's body. Then Danny comes back to life and he's completely overjoyed, especially when she kisses him — and then "Danny" bites him. As of the end of Season 2, we're not even sure if Kirsch is alive, dead, or worse.
  • Even the Dean, in the end, turns out to be rather tragic.

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