Why does Owen tell abby she has to say he can come in

[kdan101]

Hey Guys

I am new to the forum and glad to be here. I am a huge fan of both films LTROI and LMI. I love abby and Eli both and the thing the acting by all four kids was excellent but I have one question about Let Me In.

I'm sorry for bringing this question up again if it has already been asked and answered but I was browsing around some of the past topics and I didn't see it.

In let me in when owen goes to abby's apartment after the basement shortly after the scene when he cuts himself and sees her change. When he is outside the door and asks abby if he come in and she only nods but he tells her she must say it that he can come in.

Why does he do that ? why does she have to tell him he can come in ? after all he is not a vampire and he does not know yet that he has to invite her in. So why does he say that ?

Kdan

[gattoparde59]

Hello kdan101. Nice to see you here.

To answer your question I would have to go back to the original novel, because this is the only other place where this exchange appears. I don't remember how this played out in Let Me In, but my impression is that Owen is angry that Abby has been less than forthcoming about what she is exactly. This is how Owen expresses his anger over this, remembering that Abby had told him the same thing without an explanation. In the novel Eli seems hurt by this hostility from Oskar. It plays out differently in the Swedish movie, but the same friction develops because Oskar feels that Eli has not been honest with him.

[sauvin]

Hey Guys

I am new to the forum and glad to be here. I am a huge fan of both films LTROI and LMI. I love abby and Eli both and the thing the acting by all four kids was excellent but I have one question about Let Me In.

I'm sorry for bringing this question up again if it has already been asked and answered but I was browsing around some of the past topics and I didn't see it.

In let me in when owen goes to abby's apartment after the basement shortly after the scene when he cuts himself and sees her change. When he is outside the door and asks abby if he come in and she only nods but he tells her she must say it that he can come in.

Why does he do that ? why does she have to tell him he can come in ? after all he is not a vampire and he does not know yet that he has to invite her in. So why does he say that ?

Kdan

Hi, Kdan! Welcome to the forum!

My personal take is that Owen had already guessed she might be a vampire. He saw her change, and nothing in anybody's Real World experience could explain that. We saw Owen trying to reach out to his father shortly afterwards by asking if there's really such thing as Evil, so it seems pretty clear Abby's transformation left him pretty rattled. These things together with with the fact that Abby slid into his bed through a second floor window without a ladder or a rope (and after she "jokingly" said she'd flown) and had to be specifically and clearly told she could come in must have bounced around in his head quite a bit between the basement scene and the one at Abby's apartment door. The idea that she might be a vampire was already there, remember, when he blurted out "Are you a vampire?" - he didn't ask "What the FARCE, dudette!?" or "What are you!?". His question sought confirmation of what he'd already strongly suspected.

His requirement that she plainly tell him he can come in may have been a "feeler". Anybody except a vampire (of Abby's sort, at any rate) would have missed it completely. If she'd really just been a little girl, and he'd hallucinated her transformation, the most radical reaction he could expect from Abby when saying she had to tell him he could come it is "Um... OK...? You can come in...?" She didn't; she just nodded slightly and acquiesced. This was partial confirmation that Owen's suspicions weren't very wide of the truth, encouraging his much blunter question.

As for your asking questions that might already have been asked somewhere in all this forum's seventy-two THOUSAND posts, um, (hee...) who cares!? You got questions, you ask 'em! The time when it would be reasonable to expect all new members to read the whole forum before posting anything flew out the window (or maybe jumped onto a train for Karlstad) a very long time ago. Who knows, maybe something you ask will spark a whole new set of new discussions and make us see things we've not seen yet.

Until you asked this question, I'd never even thought about it, and for that, I really do welcome you to the forum.

[kdan101]

Glad to be here guys. Thanks for the responses as well as you welcomes. I appreciate both. That part of let me in had always puzzled me but your responses make sense now I think about it.

[lombano]

IIRC, Owen had to invite Abby in during the bedroom scene, and after what happened in the basement Owen presumably figures that it was the invitation rule. It's a kind of passive-aggressive attack on Abby, perhaps a way of saying 'put yourself in my position - a normal human being dating a vampire' with maybe the implied insult of 'how can I date a thing like what you are?' All the book says is that' the devil flew into him.'

[SFTifoso]

Short answer: He's being jerk.

[JToede]

Short answer: He's being jerk.

Also he's 12

[OutsideLookingIn]

I think Owen is just a socially awkward pre-teen who has befriended a very strange "girl". She tells him earlier that he has to say she can come in, and after seeing her ugly side he concludes that her permission is necessary as well.

[ziblitt]

I didn't even think it was that complicated.
He's very confused, but in love. This is his way of establishing if a) she's going to eat his face and b) if she still likes him.

[Makalli]

I thought it was just him copying her. When she comes to the window she needs an explicit invite for reasons unknown to Owen. I think he assumes its a game or a quirk and copies it.

That's how I've always viewed it anyway.