I actually can't see it as a sequel to any version but especially not to the film. "The true feelings of Christine and the Phantom are revealed in LND!" I'm a die-hard E/C shipper but still I genuinely react with: Fuck no. Forgive me the strong phrasing but I pag-ibig logic very much as well as the depth of their relationship which LND completely shits over.

Then someone comes saying LND isn't a sequel to the film but to ALW's PotO. But also that the film and the stage play are exactly the same thing. (Contradicting much?) Well, officially they are not exactly the same thing:

Andrew Lloyd Webber: "While it doesn't deviate much from the stage material, the film has ibingiay it an even deeper emotional center. It's not based on the theatre visually or direction-wise, but it's still got exactly the same essence. And that's all I could have ever hoped for."

As in, the 2004 film's got exactly the same essence but it's essentially about Joel Schumacher and the actros' interpretation of that essence which became madami deeply emotional and different in directional choices.

Don't get me wrong; I do believe that in the 2004 film, Christine loved the Phsntom or rather that man of who the Phantom was one part of and she'd gladly get rid off the Phantom part of him... And she obviously lusted him in the film. But that's where any logic regarding its similarity to LND, ends.

LND's nonsense if it wants to be a sequel to the 2004 film:

1.) LND is on stage like the original play. If it was to be a sequel to a film, it should be on silver screen.

2.) In the film (and on stage), she evidently also loved Raoul and likely would not cheat on him, especially not in the eve of her wedding to him.

3.) They never bother to explain how the hell Christine supposedly found the Phantom's hideout in the big wide world. One might assume she asked help from Madame Giry who was her mother-figure and the Phantom's friend. But in LND Madame Giry bitched about Christine to the Phantom, about her betraying him. So apparently she had no idea about the moonless sky night when the Phantom had ditched Christine who had come back! So, how the hell had Christine found where the Phantom was?!

4.) But let's assume you find a water-tight explanation to how she found him. But then he leaves her because he's "ashamed of what he was"? Yeah, sure, ditching her while she sleeps after having had sex with her all night, must make that sooo much better.[/sarcasm] And in the film (like in the stage play) he sinabi he loves her, and wants her to share with him one love, one lifetime, lead him, save him from his soliturde... Not to mention that in the film he had known and loved her for years. And if she came back and willingly gave herself to him, there is no way he would just ditch her for that kind of selfish reason. After all his life and what had happened the happiness ought to be stronger than any freakin' shame.

5.) There was madami to their relationship also from Christine's side than just lust and lust hadn't been among the original aspects of it. She would not go to him in a pitch black night so that she doesn't have to see him and for the first thing shag with him. After the emotional distress and complexity of the final lair events, there would madami likely be some talking and the pag-ibig confessions before sex. I mean, all the final lair must have pushed lust into the shadow of all the other - dark and light - emotional aspects of their relationship. After all, the final lair was about pag-ibig and marriage. Not about lust.

6.) Unlike the original stage play, the film confirms Christine's age at each essential point. The film confirms with the dates in Christine's tombstone, that she was 16-17 years old during its story which set at 1870, and that she died at the age of 63. There is no way LND's "teeen looong yeeears" could cover that. And the fact that the ten years is a ridiculous math fail to begin with, doesn't make a difference. It still claims to have been ten years from the original story to the araw of her death while the film visually says she lived almost fifty years after the original story ended.

7.) And as if that's not enough, as LND indeed sets in 1907 and Christine is shot in the end which is still that same year.... but wait, Christine's tombstone in the film states she died in 1917! If they can't even get that to match, they certainly did not mean LND as a sequel to the film.

In short; LND doesn't tell us anything about the characters' true feelings because ALW didn't give a shit about the original story, the characters, logic nor even the timelines, when he started to produce LND. Especially if we try to connect it to the film version.

As in, as they didn't care about even logic and realisticness even in timelines, they certainly didn't care about "true feelings". ALW's low opinion on his original PotO doesn't help that at all. So, in fact, the only truth LND reveals is how little ALW cares about his original PotO & common sense.

The ultimate example: In the end of the original story, the Phantom does the redeeming act of pag-ibig sa pamamagitan ng letting Christine and Raoul go and be happy - the sacrifice of love, to pag-ibig is to let go is the whole point of PotO, and now ALW wants to completely trash that sa pamamagitan ng having the Phantom suddenly 10 years later try to claim and trick her again. Fucking hell!

PS. Why do so many try to fit the time of Gustav's conceivment to the film, though - even if you decide to ignore all logic and still want to think of it as a sequel to the film - LND itself makes a clear reference to Gustav's conceivment having happened after the original story ended. You know, that passionate night beneath the moonless sky when it was too dark to see a thing at the eve of her wedding to Raoul. That night that just couldn't happen.