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The upcoming Season 6 of the mockumentary series What We Do in the Shadows is set to be the last, FX told Entertainment Weekly this Tuesday.
The sixth season was set to start production in September 2023 in Toronto, however with the WGA and SAG/AFTRA’s strikes, it was postponed and there are no released dates for their return to set yet.
Based on Taika Waititi and Jemaine Clement’s feature film with the same name, the TV show soon gained an online cult following because of its iconic one-liners and LGBTQ+ representation.
The mockumentary series follows the daily lives of a group of vampires stationed in Staten Island, New York. Laszlo (Matt Berry), Nandor (Kayvan Novak), Colin Robison (Mark Proksch), and Nadja (Natasia Demetriou) live in a mansion with their familiar, Guillermo de la Cruz (Harvey Guillén), whose dream is to become a vampire too.
Representation
All main characters are predominantly queer and unashamedly vocal about their preferences. Yet, the focal point of the story is their vampiric antics and not the characters’ sexuality alone, defying the usual design of current television.
Both, villains and good guys, are LGBTQ+ members and the show also explores different forms of relationship, such as polyamory (hinted multiple times to be the state of Lazlo and Nadja’s marriage) and the importance of friendship and found family.
The vampires participated in a night pride parade on "Pride Parade", the third episode of the fifth season, and usually tell unhinged tales about their affairs throughout the years, including between themselves.
What We Do in the Shadows is also representative of different nationalities, heritages, religions, and races. Two of the main characters are not Caucasian—Guillermo is of Mexican heritage and Nandor is Iranian—and they all come from different backgrounds. Nadja, for example, is from a village in Greece and has Romani heritage while Lazlo was born in England.
Guillermo’s family is catholic and even though they are all very religious, they are exceptionally accepting of Guillermo when he comes out to them. This is a running theme in the show as the characters are rarely discriminated by their biological characteristics or sexualities.
Award Nominations
The show has been well-accepted in the televisioncritic community as well. It has 17 wins and 137 overall nominations, including the Satellite Awards, Critics Choice Awards, and BAFTA Awards.
What We Do in the Shadows is a 21-times Emmy Nominee and has received the 2022 Emmy Award for Outstanding Fantasy/Sci-Fi Costumes.
It has a score of 8.5 on IMDb and a 97% average on Rotten Tomatoes, an exceptional feat for a comedy series that often crosses the line between fantasy and sitcom.
Spoiler Alert: Season 5 - Where were we left off
We start season 5 by discovering that Guillermo was secretly turned into a vampire by his friend Derek but is still struggling with the transformation as his Van Helsing vampire killer heritage seems to be fighting off the vampiric blood in his system.
Lazlo takes upon helping him by trying different experimentations with Guillermo. Lazlo ends up finding in Guillermo’s sweat a type of sunscreen that allows vampires to walk under broad daylight—which he promptly uses to go to the beach—and he also encourages Guillermo to jump off from a balcony to see if he can fly (he isn’t).
Early in the season, Guillermo also discovers that as a familiar he broke the rules when he was turned by another vampire and Nandor would have to kill him to establish order if he ever found out.
Nadja—who ends up discovering Guillermo’s secret when he is taken to Urgent Care after the flight fail—and Nandor try to help Guillermo hide his secret from Nandor so he can stay alive.
Nandor discovers Guillermo’s secret and tries to kill him. However, he ends up forgiving Guillermo when he realizes that Guillermo is miserable as a vampire. We also discover that the reason why Nandor never offered to turn Guillermo before was because he feared Guillermo was too human to be a vampire.
At the end of the finale, Nandor kills Derek in a ceremony—who later becomes a zombie—and Guillermo is once again human, as he wanted.
Deranged Plot Twists
What We Do in the Shadows often toys with absurdity and logic with its unforeseen plot twists and storylines.
Vampires can hypnotize crowds at once just by moving their hands and using a sing-speak code. In the eighth episode of season 4, “Go Flip Yourself”, they are selected as participants in a home renovation show and they kill one of the main presenters at first glance, proceeding to use hypnosis to hide from the audience and editors the fact that they are vampires.
There is a running gag with a cursed hat made from a witch’s skin that Lazlo was gifted after killing a Bavarian witch hunter. Simon the Devious (Nick Kroll)—a recurring character—is jealous about it and always tries to steal the hat even though catastrophes always happen whenever someone wears the accessory.
Collin Robison, the energy vampire dies when he turns 100 years old, only to be reborn with a baby body—his face remains the same. Baby Collin is then raised by Lazlo, who finds purpose in fatherhood. However, Baby Collin becomes Collin Robison again when he finds his old diaries, forgetting the time he spent as a child with Lazlo.
Reactions
Hours before the announcement of What We Do in the Shadows’ last season, Harvey Guillén posted on Instagram: “When ur just trying to celebrate Christmas.. and get terrible news”.
Overall, fans are going online, fondly remembering the show and the beloved characters, mourning the end in advance, but happy that the show is ending on good terms rather than being canceled for not having enough viewers.
The official Instagram account for the show has yet to post about season 6 being the final. But with so many streaming services reviving TV shows after their last episode, does anything ever really end? Until then, it is super slumber time.
Edited by Victoria Muzio
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