Monsters are evergreen tropes in fictional media. Part of that concerns how versatile the themes different monsters represent have evolved over time. Take vampires for example; Bram Stoker penned one of the ur-texts of vampire lore to warn people about the dangers of foreigners and how they’ll spoil our women with sex. These days, vampires typically represent themes of ennui, predation, unchained desires, and parasitism, but they’re also effectively unsettling monsters. You don’t need to see some deeper meaning to vampires to feel something when you see them bare fangs. Today’s viewers, however, have seen a lot of vampires and that can make further vampire tales feel a little been there/done that.
What We Do in the Shadows found a fresh angle in not only dragging the gorgeous superpredators down into the mundane airs of Staten Island but also by placing these immortal monsters in an irreverent sitcom. And with the final season premiering on Hulu with a three-episode extravaganza, I plan to savor every last drop.
What We Do in the Shadows has always engaged with the past and mined the fish-out-of-water foibles of vampires existing in the 2020s, but this season appears to be in an especially reflective mood. It seems like the series is headed off on a victory lap and will be revisiting familiar ideas and people as it wraps itself up. There are echoes of familiar dynamics and characters, like the vampire Jerry (Mike O’Brien), who has been asleep since Gerald Ford was president and has belatedly joined the cast as a fifth roommate we didn’t know was there.
This calls to mind Baron Afanas (Doug Jones), who existed as the colorful fifth roommate of earlier seasons. The first three episodes also contained signs of change and development for our favorite vampires. Nadja (Natasia Demetriou) continues last season’s arc of her stumbling attempts to help others, though with a decidedly Nadja angle; murdering your friend’s coworkers so they can climb the corporate ladder is helpful in the way a cat thinks it’s helpful when they bring you a dead mouse. Nandor (Kayvan Novak) continues his similarly faltering attempts at being kinder, though arguably with more success. In the first three episodes, he shows more respect for janitors than most living humans do. Colin (Mark Proksch) is more or less the same lethally boring energy vampire, but there’s some added focus on his loneliness that I hope is a thread we follow. Perhaps, in the show’s tour of adventures past, we’ll get to see Evie (Vanessa Bayer) again and we’ll have our devastating power couple back together. Laszlo (Matt Berry) brings back his endless supply of sublime line readings (the magic Berry does with a simple “mmmmm”) and gets up to such shenanigans as a Frankenstein riff. Laszlo corners Colin with a lecture on alchemy that cleverly reverses the usual dynamic of borer and boree.
Guillermo (Harvey Guillén) finds a very poignant plotline when, at the end of the third episode, he loses his memories and forgets all the events of the past five seasons. This kind of upset is pretty notable for a sitcom, a form of media that relies heavily on the reset button to return their cast to baseline for their next adventure but fear not. What We Do in the Shadows still finds a way to reset Guillermo, but with an ironic twist: with no memory, Guillermo promptly applies for the job of Nandor’s familiar. It seems more than likely that in time, our poor familiar-turned-vampire hunter-turned-vampire will have his memories restored. It seems like a wonderful pretense to relive the past.
It’s fitting for What We Do in the Shadows to look backward as it enters its final season, but it wouldn’t be the inventive, clever show it is if it didn’t do it in its own funny way. It’s always embraced its sitcom form and found hilarious ways to twist, subvert, or do something new with its tropes. I have loved this show dearly since it premiered and I will miss it fiercely when it’s gone. When I reflect on other Taika Waititi-produced properties that have come out since What We Do in the Shadows premiered in 2019 (like Our Flag Means Death, Reservation Dogs, or Time Bandits), it makes me think there’s something special about the show that’s allowed it to survive. I’m sure each fan can name different reasons, but for me, it’s how the show balances a real heart with its wicked, wacky, and deliciously dark sense of humor. What We Do in the Shadows could have embraced the seriousness and navel-gazing that can dominate vampire media, but instead, it embraces a joyously chaotic sense of fun.
Comedies that make you laugh at loud are increasingly rare these days, as comedy is cut more and more with drama. What We Do in the Shadows is a scarce breed that loads up on puns and silly visual gags in an age of comedic seriousness. I also want to praise the series for being so, so damn queer. What We Do in the Shadows takes vampiric libertinism for granted, but neatly sidesteps any implication that sexual fluidity is somehow monstrous. Lazslo, Nadja, and Nandor all have an unruffled, unbothered quality to their fluid sexualities that’s been exhilarating for this anxious queer to take in. It’s notable to find that sort of thing anywhere, but it feels especially like a precious treasure when one considers that What We Do in the Shadows isn’t so much a “gay show” as it is a show for just about anyone that features queerness as a natural part of its world. It’s so simple, but it’s meant a lot to me as someone who seeks good representation. I didn’t expect to find it in a goofy clown show about vampires on Staten Island, but it’s where I found it all the same. I will savor the last season of What We Do in the Shadows and I hope you do too.