Christian Coulson - Tumblr Posts

christian coulson i love you and even though there's so little about you and you have no other relevant roles besides tom riddle and it's so hard to find your other movies youre still the man with the sweetest smile ive ever seen

tom riddle ffs supremacy>>>

most of them are literally so beautiful and elegant at the same time. and, the writers write so beautifully you wouldn't have thought it was a fanfiction, it's almost like a classic book written by well known writers like jane austen.

if anyone would like to recommend more tom riddle ffs (please do), you can comment it on the comment section!

7/28/22

gifs of my baby, hehe

8/4/22

tom riddle is my inspiration in academics, he's so smart and beautiful at the same time

9/5/22

can you rec some of your fav tom riddle fics? 🤍

omg, someone finally asked this question!!

1.) His Dark Lady - dxddydracomalfoyyy

This is probably the most loveable of them all, my fave book of all time.

2.) A Riddle to Solve - SSTAR2000

Another really unique book, the mc is really powerful although some parts are a bit cringe (?) because it feels like she's everything like those memes on tt of y/n. Overall a good book though (try it out).

3.) Oh, Ophelia - Maebelletree

I really love this too especially because it is a unique book, I haven't read any other tmr books like this.

4.) Now and then - hmmdisgustin

It is just like the title going back and forth from now and then.

5.) Kneel - JulieHoscar

I absolutely abhor Tom Riddle in this book, but I'm still going to recommend it because I still do like this book. This book make me feel ambivalent.

6.) RIDDLE. DISCONTINUED - ravenclaws-

Although this book was discontinued, it still has a very good plot line, it shouldn't have been discontinued, but I guess it is very hard to write a story. Maybe in the future it will be renewed (?) hopefully.

7.) Midmorning - murderarts

This book is heartbreaking, even though it is only a short story, I still feel emotionally attached to it.

That's it for the recommendation, notice I did 7? It's because it is believed that Tom riddle rather likes the number 7 and also because of his seven horcruxes.

DISCLAIMER: All of these are in wattpad!!

the many faces of tom riddle, part 3

-everyone’s favorite, for a reason: motive, means, and opportunity-

FULL DISCLAIMER THAT THIS IS JUST MY OPINION OF A CHARACTER WHO DOESN’T HAVE THE STRONGEST CANON CHARACTERIZATION, AND THUS ALL THIS IS BASED ON MY CONCEPTUALIZATION.

I didn’t have to introduce him in the first line, because you all know i’m talking about Christian Coulson, aka the fandom’s darling.

Just to get this out of the way, I’m going to come out and say it. His portrayal was brilliant; exactly how i imagined it when reading the books. He captured the way Tom slips from charming and innocent to vicious and vindictive in an instant. In fact, I don’t think I can find much to complain about. Coulson is Tom Riddle.

Tom Riddle's 'mask'

Here's Slughorn's impression of Tom Riddle as a student (it's only in the movies, but I like it):

I... of course, it's only natural you should want to know more. But I'm afraid I must disappoint you, Harry. When I first met young Mr. Riddle, he was a quiet, albeit brilliant boy committed to becoming a first-rate wizard. Not unlike others I've known. Not unlike yourself, in fact. If the monster existed, it was buried deep within.

The very first time we meet Tom Riddle in the diary, again, it’s from Harry’s perspective. Everything is in this soft, old-timey sepia tone, which tells us it’s a long time ago, but also softens Tom Riddle. So, when Harry (who, again, is the POV character) sees him framing Hagrid, we think, yes, we should trust Tom Riddle.

This mask of good behaviour is what keeps Tom safe, and when it starts to slip, he becomes vulnerable.

Just look at how sincere Coulson looks while he’s framing Hagrid. The concerned (drawn in) eyebrows, the sad head-tilt... I don’t think there’s much I can say, because that scene just pretty much speaks for itself.

How can Harry (and the audience) not fall for it? And in the same way, everyone but Dumbledore (who met him before Hogwarts) is completely taken in.

And while I could wax poetic about the brilliant filmography all through this scene, I want to talk about something else. To drag up that Jung quote from Part 2 -- “I am not what happened to me, I am what I choose to become...”

How did Tom Riddle choose to become Lord Voldemort?

In Philosopher’s Stone, we get a particularly insightful quote from the character himself, which is as much as we get in terms of a moral code:

“There is no good and evil, there is only power and those too weak to seek it.”

Some quick definitions on the distinction between right/good and wrong/evil: Right things are obligatory; good things are worth doing. Wrong things must be avoided, evil things are of negative value. (Okay, evil is a hand-wave-y topic and some people think wrong is the same as evil, or perhaps we should do away with the concept of evil, more on it here. But I don’t think Tom’s claim here is him trying to make a point or engage in a philosophical debate with Harry about the difficulty of distinguishing evil versus good or evil versus wrong in a hypothetical sense, and rather that he wants to liberate himself from moral responsibility altogether.) Everything Tom Riddle has done up to the events of June 13, 1943, is, well... eh. He hung Billy’s rabbit -- yes, pretty vindictive and worrying behaviour, but it’s a rabbit and Tom was eleven years old at most at the time. We also hear from Mrs. Cole that he might have traumatized Dennis and Amy in the infamous Cave, and the possibility of something nefarious going on there is supported by the fact that he later chose it as a hiding place for one of his Horcruxes.

However, none of this is confirmed, Mrs. Cole is possibly an unreliable narrator, we can go back-and-forth on this, we don’t know what exactly went on, and even if both of these incidents occurred, I don’t think that’s enough to put Tom firmly on the Path To Evil (TM)... What’s interesting about Diary Tom Riddle, is that he does believe in good. In fact, if I had to come up with one word to describe his attitude in this scene, Coulson comes across as righteous. This doesn't feel like an indulgent, Joker-esque revel in evil.

Adult Tom doesn't really act this way towards Harry; he just thinks he's smart and all-powerful, and Harry is beneath him.

His entire purpose for existing is to "lead another to finish Salazar Slytherin's noble work."

He speaks to Harry almost with contempt, because he's obviously in the right. And this is pretty funny, because adult Tom really doesn't care about right and wrong or good and evil in the first place, while his teenage self struts around the Chamber, pretending to have the moral high ground. I think Coulson did a really great job on portraying the sheer hubris of a Tom Riddle who has just dipped his toes into true evil, and perhaps doesn't even realise it.

Emphasis on the noble. A noble thing is worth doing; a thing worth doing is good. Ergo, Diary Tom believes in the concept of good (and perhaps, by extension, evil). In fact, this is the last time we will hear ‘moral duty’ reasoning out of Tom for reasons that will be discussed below. And what I find really interesting about this, is what it suggests about Tom's internal state: he either doesn't believe in right and wrong (because murder is wrong), or he does, and just doesn't adhere to it. The latter is more likely than you think: Here's a conclusion from the linked paper (about young children, but still interesting) that I think could apply here: "In summary, a concern for relative advantage may prevent children from enacting their knowledge of fairness when actual resources are at stake."

In short, the appeal of making a Horcrux and avoiding death is so great that he could be willing to kill for it.

Tom is incredibly self-serving, and that goes without saying. When Dippet said that Hogwarts would shut down if the monster wasn't found and dealt with, he made the snap decision to rat out 'that brainless oaf' Hagrid and Aragog (okay, not Hagrid's best idea and it could have killed people, but Tom wasn't doing it out of the goodness of his heart, or else he would have done it sooner). Since here, I think it's fairly plausible that Tom Riddle is fully aware of right and wrong, then what exactly drives him to murder?

"Anyway, what really got me was that it was a boy speaking. So I unlocked the door, to tell him to go and use his own toilet, and then — I died."

I’ve heard a few competing theories about Myrtle Warren’s death:

1. Myrtle’s death was an accident: Tom was messing around with the basilisk, and didn’t realise he had an audience. Myrtle opened the stall door and her death was an honest mistake. Tom decided to capitalize on this and use the incident to make his first Horcrux. 2. Myrtle’s death was an accident: Tom was messing around with the basilisk, and didn’t realise he had an audience. Fearing being caught, Tom set the basilisk on Myrtle to keep his secret safe. Tom decided to capitalize on this and use the incident to make his first Horcrux. 3. Myrtle’s death was planned: Tom was intending to make a Horcrux, and decided to kill Myrtle because she was an easy target and no one liked her, so it would take a long time to find her body, minimizing the risk to him. 4. Myrtle’s death was kind of planned: Tom was intending to kill Muggle-borns, and poor Myrtle just happened to be there. 5. There was no real reason; Tom just likes killing people.

Out of the options, I think in terms of canon (of course fanon is whatever you like), we can rule out (1) immediately. Why? Because, although we don’t know all the sordid details, we do know that the act of murder is necessary to create a Horcrux. Perhaps, you can argue what constitutes a murder, but in my opinion, (1) is at best a tragic accident, at worst criminal negligence. So not, in my opinion, soul-splitting evil. (2), while it might be considered second-degree (I am not a legal expert by any means) still counts as murder, I think. But it does beg the question: why play around with what is in essence a weapon of mass destruction if you don’t intend to cause harm? And Diary Tom does talk about his intention to ‘kill Mudbloods.’ So, I think we can say (2) is unlikely. (3) and (4), I think, are equally probable, and both motives could in theory coexist. Something like this, perhaps?

Salazar Slytherin is revered by my housemates, who I look up to -> Salazar Slytherin is good -> His ideals are good -> purging the school of Muggle-borns is good, plus it benefits me in that I get to make a Horcrux -> killing Myrtle Warren is good.

(5) is by far the most extreme, and I think this is also improbable; because Tom seems to have decent impulse control, at least. If we look at the rest of his criminal profile around this time -- he attempts to kill Harry, and killed his Muggle family, both of which are personal -- and it's unlikely Myrtle and Tom would have known each other well enough from Tom to have enough of a vendetta to kill her. It also doesn't look like a crime of passion. Also, (5) is a boring option. Making Tom Riddle a mindless killer would suck all the fun out of my ramblings...

So, what now?

Assuming that we're going with (3) and (4) as most probable, I don't think it's likely that Tom thinks murder is right. You can make the case that given what we discussed in Part 2, as a child, at least, he might have had impaired moral reasoning, but I'm wary about saying that he flat-out doesn't know right from wrong, especially when it comes to something like murder, and we've seen him use moral duty reasoning (to justify something inherently wrong, but it still proves he can think about morals in an abstract way). But he has to rationalize it, somehow...

Further evidence against (1) -- Tom seems rather blasé about the whole idea of 'killing mudbloods.'

Meanwhile, it's also not a top priority, but I can't tell if it's a throwaway villain line or not.

Unlike in HBP, here, Tom is in control of the situation. And appropriately, from the moment he enters, Coulson is an intense, dominating presence, even in the towering architecture of the Chamber; first reassuring, then threatening as he allows more and more of his true intentions to become visible to Harry (who goads him into revealing them).

He almost seems... obsessive, but almost without direction or hope (soulless, perhaps), as he circles Harry -- and there's that desperation that drives Tom Riddle to the extremes of moral depravity. And what comes across well in Coulson's portrayal, is that Harry and Tom still, even given the high stakes, seem like two schoolboys having an argument.

Introducing cognitive dissonance:

1. He believes murder is wrong 2. He's murdered someone 3. We know that in order to successfully make a Horcrux, you can't feel the guilt or remorse associated with your actions (or else you'll end up healing your soul). 4. Tom has to rationalize his actions in order to not feel guilty. From Bem (1967),

If a person holds two cognitions that are inconsistent with one another, he will experience the pressure of an aversive motivational state called cognitive dissonance, a pressure which he will seek to remove, among other ways, by altering one of the two "dissonant" cognitions

Here's a link to Festinger (1957)'s work introducing the concept.

1. The existence of dissonance, being psychologically uncomfortable, will motivate the person to try to reduce the dissonance and achieve consonance. 2. When dissonance is present, in addition to trying to reduce it, the person will actively avoid situations and information which would likely increase the dissonance.

So, Tom will want to resolve the thoughts that he thinks murder is wrong, with the fact that he has murdered. And he can't take back what he's done. He can, however, change his moral code (this is referred to as forced compliance). The deed has been done. He's killed Myrtle. Tom can't change that -- but he can change his attitude.

Specifically, Tom can decide to believe that murder, if not right, is at least not wrong.

And this is a real danger. This causes him to repeat the behaviour, and enforce this belief, until, yeah, sure, there is no good and evil.

Here's the graveyard quote again, because I'm going to reference it:

“You see that house upon the hillside, Potter? My father lived there. My mother, a witch who lived here in this village, fell in love with him. But he abandoned her when she told him what she was…. He didn’t like magic, my father … He left her and returned to his Muggle parents before I was even born, Potter, and she died giving birth to me, leaving me to be raised in a Muggle orphanage … but I vowed to find him … I revenged myself upon him, that fool who gave me his name … Tom Riddle. …”

A few months later, Tom goes to the Gaunt Shack, and hears Morfin’s version of events — that Riddle Senior left Merope because he found out that she was a witch. Tom (probably) flies into a blind rage, furious that his precious pureblood relatives are just a crazy man living in a filthy shack, believing that his ‘dirty Muggle father’ betrayed him and his mother, and didn’t love him or Merope, storms up the hill and murders Tom, Thomas, and Mary — then returns to the Gaunt shack, and takes the family ring, which becomes his second Horcrux.

And the fact that he made a Horcrux means that, again, he can't feel guilty, so this serves to really solidify his belief in pureblood supremacy and the rightness of murder into his allowable acts.

If killing Myrtle was dipping his toes into true evil, then slaughtering the Riddles is an entire left turn. Once is a mistake, twice is a pattern, and three times is a habit.

And I discussed this briefly in Part 2, but the fact that it's patricide, is especially poignant from a character perspective.

In the Roman Republic, patricide was the only crime for which a civilian could be sentenced to death.

But, I did do a quick look at the literature (which I'm not going to link because gory images) relating to patricide (there's not much, and not a lot that's recent -- the FBI agent watching my Google searches must think I'm a real weirdo). Incidents are rare and it seems to correlate with psychotic disorders and paranoia (which doesn't really fit Tom's psychological profile), and it's usually quite a violent crime (as in blunt trauma, stabbing, etc).

Whereas it's implied that Tom used the Killing Curse (there wasn't a single mark on the Riddles' bodies), which though 'unforgivable' is a rather humane way to kill. Also, there's usually a history of family violence/child abuse, and Tom didn't even know his father.

"The murder in most cases is committed in the house where perpetrators reside with the victim. It has been observed that sons/daughters who kill their parents frequently use painful methods and excessive violence, sometimes employing multiple fatal methods, thus resulting in overkill."

In fact, the only thing that seems to match up is Tom's age and the fact that sons are more commonly perpetrators than daughters.

Point being, I think the patricide bit was just put in to make Tom sound more evil. It just doesn't make sense for his character (I mean, you could make the case that he's a sadist, but... eh... a discussion for another time -- sadistic personality disorder was taken out of the DSM, anyway so I don't think there's much point in discussing it at all... and 'sadism' is a lot more common than you think.)

Anyway, the logically simplest thing to do now is to throw out the ideals of good and evil — no more pesky behavioral-cognitive dissonance. And this is when Tom becomes completely lost — everything and anything goes. He doesn’t need justification anymore.

I know I said I wasn't going to wax poetic about filmography, but everything about this shot is brilliant. Perhaps the light/dark duality is a bit obvious, but Hero Fiennes-Tiffin (who plays eleven-year-old Tom) is shown exactly the same way in HBP and yes, I will talk about that, too.

Sorry, another Jung quote incoming:

“How can I be substantial if I do not cast a shadow? I must have a dark side also If I am to be whole.”

I'm going to take a brief digression into the esoterics of Jung's theories, but this is where MBTI comes from (he was the first to talk about extroversion/introversion), anyway... again, not current theory, but early twentieth-century psychology is interesting when it comes to interpreting characters.

Jung believed that there were four parts of our personality, two of which I'm going to mention briefly:

The Persona: Basically our 'mask' -- the self we present to the outside world, represents conformity.

The Shadow: The chaotic, animalistic part of your personality, represents creative and destructive energy.

And, for the first time, after Tom reveals his identity to Harry, he turns with this look of utter confidence, and not incidentally, we see his face partially shadowed for the first time. Whereas before, he was presenting the 'persona', here, we finally get to see the 'shadow' as well. The shadow does not represent a clarity or completeness anymore than the persona does; it's just a different way of being not whole. Instead of taking responsibility for his own actions, Tom's "perceived personal inferiority is recognized as a perceived moral deficiency in someone else." -- in this case, 'Mudbloods.' It's not a coincidence that this is when Coulson turns around and finally mentions his 'filthy Muggle father', the thing he's most ashamed of.

(Again, the theme of not being whole, and immaturity).

But why does he choose to murder in the first place? Why did Tom Riddle open the Chamber of Secrets?

I think Tom assumes that his Muggle father most likely died before he was born, which is why Merope named him after him. Tom hates his father because he’s learned pureblood supremacy from his fellow Slytherins, and covets the respect and power that would come with being pureblood himself as he’s sick of being mistaken for a Muggle-born (we’ve seen Dippet do it) and feels that he has to prove himself as the Heir of Slytherin by opening the CoS, having no proof of magical heritage. I don't think he's that stupid to go around flashing his Parseltongue, especially given Dumbledore's response to it, and it doesn't prove that he's the Heir of Slytherin, anyway.

Dumbledore mentions off-hand that he thinks Tom Riddle's gang helped him, but by his own admission, Tom's not fond of relying on others and I think opening the Chamber without help is well within his capabilities.

Seeing as the public doesn't know that Lord Voldemort opened the Chamber of Secrets (and thus don't know that he's the Heir of Slytherin, either), I think Tom did it all for the good of his own ego, insecurity, and of course that self-harming behaviour turned outwards that we discussed before.

In Part 1, we discussed the underlying themes of self-harm inherent in the concept of a Horcrux; especially compared to the less destructive process of making the Elixir of Life/the Philosopher's Stone. But I don't think Tom is aware of that subtext.

Now, I doubt that it's a case of oversight. If Tom looked hard enough for ways to become immortal to find Horcruxes, he must have known about the Philosopher's Stone (even I knew what that was before I read the HP books, and I'm a Muggle!).

But here's a weird thing Tom says in HBP:

"Yes, sir," said Riddle. "What I don't understand, though -- just out of curiosity -- I mean, would one Horcrux be much use? Can you only split your soul once? Wouldn't it be better, make you stronger, to have your soul in more pieces, I mean, for instance, isn't seven the most powerfully magical number, wouldn't seven -- ?"

Although we think that such a destructive process must weaken Tom, even Dumbledore doesn't seem to think that's the case:

"Yes, I think so," said Dumbledore. "Without his Horcruxes, Voldemort will be a mortal man with a maimed and diminished soul. Never forget, though, that while his soul may be damaged beyond repair, his brain and his magical powers remain intact. It will take uncommon skill and power to kill a wizard like Voldemort even without his Horcruxes."

Dumbledore also seems to think that Tom intended to make even more than seven Horcruxes:

Harry: "But I thought he meant Lucius Malfoy to smuggle it [the diary] into Hogwarts?" Dumbledore: "Yes, he did, years ago, when he was sure he would be able to create more Horcruxes..."

And again:

"Yes, I think the idea of a seven-part soul would greatly appeal to Lord Voldemort."

So, it seems that Horcruxes either don't affect your abilities, or even make you more powerful.

Since we don't get much canon information other than this, I decided to turn to other sources.

What instantly springs to mind (for me, at least) with the whole soul container concept is Koschei the Immortal/Koschei the Deathless, (okay I didn't have a lot of friends as a kid and I quite possibly have too much random mythology stuff floating around in my brain) an evil sorcerer from Russian folklore. Like Tom Riddle, he's afraid of death, and usually becomes immortal by hiding his soul in a needle that is hidden inside an egg, which is carried by a duck that flies away from anyone who tries to catch it. Sounds like a Horcrux, right?

(He's also fond of stealing your girl.)

But once you, the strapping young hero Y/N, manage to beat the odds and retrieve the egg, you've got two options.

You can break the egg, get to the needle and destroy Koschei's soul, killing him and allowing you to go rescue the damsel(s) in distress and save the kingdom. Eh, close enough.

Tom is unable to resist the temptation to gloat about Lord Voldemort returning 'very much alive.'

"You'll be with your dear Mudblood mother soon, Harry."

And this is one of my favourite things about Coulson's portrayal; he doesn't come off as Cartoon Evil -- while obviously being capable, dangerous, and having an extremely twisted moral code, he does feel like a teenage Voldemort. Highly skilled, yes -- but unpolished, prideful, and arrogant to a fault -- like the darker version of a Hermione-esque know-it-all. And there's that deeply-unfulfilled emptiness that we talked about in Part 2.

And given what we know about Tom's 'relationship' with Merope from HBP, there's almost a sense of jealousy here, and that fits so well with the character.

When Tom Riddle allows the extent of his true viciousness to show, he cements his downfall by basically handing Harry the tools to destroy him. As he taunts Harry, who is literally at his feet and dying from the basilisk's poison (Diary Tom gets the distinction of being the only incarnation of Voldemort who actually had a decent go at killing Harry -- if not for Fawkes, he would have been done for), he mentions the diary, which of course gives Harry (whose quick thinking is pretty incredible, might I add) the information he needs to destroy Tom.

There's another option. I mentioned that Koschei is a sorcerer -- that means that he's got all sorts of OP power-ups, like flying, shape-shifting, spellcasting, etc.

And once you, Y/N, are in possession of the egg, you have Koschei under your control, and he'll start to weaken. He'll get sick and lose his magic powers.

However, we don't really see this with Horcruxes. In the books, Tom has no idea when they've been destroyed, and it doesn't seem to weaken him.

And so, I can't help but wonder if the opposite is true... if Tom Riddle creates Horcruxes, would that grant him additional magic powers?

Seems plausible, and we'll discuss this more in Part 5.

And if so, for a sixteen-year-old Tom Riddle at the major turning point that will define his character trajectory, is that sufficient motive... to murder?

[Next time: more child psych, Wool's Orphanage, and the long-debated Dumbledore Problem]