IWTV S3: The Vampire Lestat
Oh boy, do I have things to say about this season.
Hi there! Feel free to join me as I trash this season simply because I have free will and lots of anger after watching the finale:)
Disclaimer: These are my personal opinions. You're free to disagree or dislike what I say, but please be respectful. And for the record, I haven't read the books, so this is entirely based on the show. Thank you!
Also, this is a pure rant and I didn't have a script, I'm only running on vibes and hatred. Thanks.
I've divided this in 4 sections: general comments, opinions regarding the main characters, specific scenes I disliked, and specific parts I did like about the season.
Now, here are the problems I had with Interview With The Vampire: The Vampire Lestat.
- The pacing is so bad it's honestly kind of funny: there are a billion things happening every episode, yet the story doesn't move an inch forward and we're stuck right where we started up until like episode 4.
- With so much happening, the supposedly emotional scenes can't be appreciated as intended because there's NO TIME TO PROCRESS THEM and I don't mean it in the sense of "make Lestat talk for 10 minutes straight", but instead, the writers should've allowed the characters to sit with their emotions, discuss the traumatic event that took place, and answer to that event. Why the fuck are we moving on so fast from the Claudia scene in episode 6?
- The story being told through the tapes doesn't work, and I can't, for the life of me, understand why they didn't follow the "documentary" style through Lestat's POV, which would've been a great opportunity to explore Lestat's life and relationship with his mother, while giving Daniel's character a purpose and an actual role in the story.
- There are so many unnecessary scenes. Why are you introducing the band members and giving them so much screentime when they don't really matter to the story? Why are you wasting time showing yet again and again and again the many ways through which Gabriella has abused Lestat?
- All the racist lines????? wtf I'm not even getting into all of that
His arc with Regina goes absolutely nowhere, he doesn't react in any way to witnessing Claudia's anger, and his only purpose this season was to be Lestat's lover. Amazing. What about the fact that he became the world's most sought-after vampire? Oh, we don't talk about that, it's all cool. What about Lemuel? Well, he doesn't appear past episode 2. Why is he apologizing to Armand after Armand killed his daughter in a mock play and then pretended to save him in order to build a fantasy life by his side? They were mutually abusive to each other and THAT'S FINE, this is literally the abusers™ show; why are we acting like Louis using Armand to get back at Lestat is such a big deal?
Then, everything regarding Claudia was done so poorly oh my goodness. My man tried to kill himself in S2E05 because Armand said Claudia didn't love him, but in S3E06 we see Claudia in the flesh calling Louis out and insulting him, and Louis doesn't care in the slightest. Make it make sense.
Oh, poor Lestat:( he's such a poor boy and a victim of abuse:( if only that wasn't the basic storyline for every single character in this show. Armand was abused and sold to a brothel at 12 years old, but we're supposed to hate him because he's bad. Lestat was abused by his mother and Magnus, but we're supposed to pity him despite the fact that he's perpetuated the endless cicle of abuse, the exact same way every single chatacter has done.
And I get that this season is told through his lenses, so of course it'll be nuanced, but S1 and S2 were told through Louis' perspective and yet he didn't escape criticism for all the shitty things he did. That happened mainly because Daniel was there to question him, but this time we don't have anyone to question Lestat, so we just have to accept everything as it is without a doubt.
Sure, let's go ahead and make one of our best actors have 10 minutes of screentime, and use him as nothing but an "ah ha!" moment every single episode.
He's the main antagonist of the season (in the sense that he intends to stop Lestat from carrying out The Great Conversion), but really, the only reason he beheaded Lestat and Louis was because he was resentful at Louis:) Who cares about The Great Conversion? There's more important things at to do, like killing Larry(???????), hiring a Claudia lookalike to psychologically torture Louis, becoming friends with Alex, and filming TikToks with Daniel. The only thing missing in the finale was Armand having an evil laugh after an evil monologue where he shares all of his evil plans with the person he kidnapped— oh wait.
Don't even get me started. There was so much POTENTIAL: we could've seen the transition from human to vampire and how that affected Daniel as a journalist, we could've explored him adapting to this new lifestyle and how his relationship with Louis + other vampires changed, or maybe we could've learned something about his relationship with Armand and his role as maker, instead of making them "companions" out of nowhere because apparently everything happened off screen.
What about how the world disappears and he can only feel Armand through their bond? What about the fact that he's just discovered Armand has been spying him for 52 years? How did they became besties and planned to behead Louis and Lestat? Idk bro it just happened. There are so many interesting things we could've explored, but instead, we get nothing. Motherfucker spent more time bowling than with Lestat or Armand what the hell 😭
Also, why the fuck was he SO ANGRY at Lestat? I mean yeah, Lestat fucked with his documentary but Daniel had already posted a revenge porn and told the entire world that Lestat was fucking his mom like???? I'd argue that makes them even 😭
If anything, the beheading and taking Lestat's head bowling only makes him look petty (and Daniel /is/ petty, but maybe if we'd seen how becoming a vampire made him an egomaniac to the tenth power, and how he know feels invincible because Armand is by his side, I don't know, maybe if we'd seen ANYTHING leading up to Daniel's attitude, the beheading wouldn't have seemed as childish as it did).
3. Scenes I absolutely despised:
Look, I adored Assad's acting in the scene, but the whole thing didn't really make sense. We had already explored Armand's abuse trauma and there were so many better ways to approach the subject again without making him torture Louis for no fucking reason at all.
If they wanted to make Armand the villain, I think they should've directed his anger towards Lestat, who openly mocked him during a concert, exposed his identify, and laughed at him. I think that's kind of a bigger offense than Louis getting angry after finding out that Armand planned Claudia's death and lied to him for 60 years, but maybe that's just me.
What the fuck man 😭? Why is Louis suddenly all too comfortable reading Claudia's most personal part of her diaries TO HER ABUSER????? He would NOT fucking say that.
- Lestat's abuse by Magnus mirroring Claudia's:
Ngl this scene was pure cinema. How the scenes mimic each other because they /both/ went through very similar forms of abuse, and how Lestat finally accepts it as it was, instead of masking it under the lenses of a fortuitous situation, the way he makes it seem seem during the Magnus videoclip montage.
This time, we see it as it is: Magnus forcing himself upon Lestat, turning him against his will and Lestat crying and screaming and unable to fight it, so much like what Claudia suffered. It's a horrifying parallel that shows yet again just how many things Claudia and Lestat had in common.
- Claudia's summoning scene:
Ok, not the entire scene (wtf was Louis' "And what about the thing you should be thanking me for?" line), but there's a specific line I quite loved:
Dress on the wall.
Song on the radio.
Pay some broke witch a pittance to drag me out of my spidery-ass nowhere.
What about Madeleine?
It brings light to the fact that neither Louis nor Lestat are capable of letting Claudia go, and they do so by exploiting their memory through the dress and the songs, too focused on their own pain to realize what she would think about it.
And, of course, Claudia calling out for Madeleine was a hell of a scene. Really, Delainey and everyone in the cast does an amazing job.
- Armand and Daniel's scene outside of Lestat's concert:
What can I say? I'm a basic sucker for dm's crumbs, and this did wonders for me. Armand losing his cool because Daniel is the only one capable of getting on his nerves? Armand reluctantly admitting that everything he did was out of love?
If only the writers had built an actual storyline for them after this scene, but nope. Go girl, give us nothing.
• The vampiric fight in episode 01, since it's the first time we see Daniel as a vampire.
• Gabriella's "I love you" said in order to manipulate Lestat and abuse him, demonstrating the power she holds in their relationship.
• Akasha's awakening. Top tier acting right there. Scared the shit out of me.
• Nicki's storyline. I think he was the only character's story I actually enjoyed in its entirety.
• Lestat's panic attack after Louis finds out about Lestat and Gabriella (but I think that's just Sam's acting lol).
• The parallels between Gabriella forcing Lestat to see the women burn under the witch trials, and Lestat forcing Claudia to see her lover burn.
• The first time Regina acts as Claudia. Holy shit that fucked me up.
- And of course, the thing I loved the most: that the season ended 🫶
Anyway, here's my grain of salt that literally no one asked for. Many thanks for reading! I'd love to hear your thoughts:)
For the sake of my mental health, I'll pretend this season didn't exist <3
