Interview With the Vampire: Last Call for Dead Blood
You don’t have to go home but you can’t stay in New Orleans!
It’s Grande Finale time, treasured subscribers! First: apologies, as I am sending this week’s final Interview With the Vampire recap a day late due to being GRAVELY ILL with COVID. Don’t worry about me, tho! I’m getting hot blood infusions from my sexy manservant who might be fully gaslighting me and holding me hostage???
Ok, we pick back up probably I guess the next day after aged GRAVELY ILL has-been journalist (we have so much in common!) Danielle Mallory had that dream where he remembered that Louis’s snooty manservant and blood-donor Rashid was actually there at the San Francisco homogay saloon where he first met Louis in 1970-whatever. So, now he’s even more suspicioso of that Rashid.
Over…dinner, or some meal, Daniel is asking all about how Louis and Claudia planned to kill Lestat. Apparently the ways to kill vampires are: 1) starve; 2) fire; 3) off-with-their-head; and also 4) drink “blood from the dead.” Which I guess is the same as drink dead blood? I don’t know! This rule is so confusing! Like, clearly vampires don’t have to eat blood directly out of a living person because Louis is literally slurping hemoglobins out of a bowl. So, like, does that mean whoever “donated” that blood has to still be alive somewhere and also WHY DOES THAT MATTER??? Ugh. This is such a weird dumb rule that isn’t even really consistent in the actual books so…shrug??
Anyway, in the past (which is maybe the early 1940s at this point?), Lestat is basically holding Louis and Claudia hostage, and they are all miserable. But like, why tho? Why is he even doing this? Is it even fun for Lestat anymore? Doesn’t seem like it!
Then one night, all three of them are not really at all enjoying an evening at home, slowly bleeding this random dude to death and hating each other, when there’s a knock at the door . It’s some other random guy who is dying of cancer and thinks they know the secret to eternal life or something. Apparently, these three are so bad at being discreet with their murders and eternal youth that the whole town pretty much fully believes they’ve made a pact with the devil.
Tough break for that dying guy though, because they kill him. Also, Lestat is like, “Ok, time to get the hell out of New Orleans!”
So, they start planning their big move. Louis suggests Greece, and Lestat is like, “Ooooh, no, we can’t go to there because that’s where Those Must be Kept arrrrr…I mean the King and Queen of all Vampiiiii… I mean the source of all the undeaaaaaaa… I mean NEVER MIND we just can’t go there!” (Is Lestat the Easter Bunny? Because he just laid an EGG!)
Meanwhile, Claudia is still plotting and scheming to do a murder on Lestat. But she can’t tell Louis her whole plan, because she thinks Lestat will just kiss and bone it right out of him. So, he’s mostly in the dark at this point, just going along with it like, “Sure, ok, I guess we’re murdering my boyfriend who I kinda love with my whole heart and soul? I’m fine with all this and definitely not way too influenced and constantly manipulated by basically all of my loved ones.”
But ok, here’s what we know about Claudia’s Master Plan to Murder Lestat: Step 1, convince him to throw a big huge going away Mardi Gras party where they will murder all of New Orleans society. “It’s Mardi Gras!” Claudia says. “No one will possibly notice us loudly and obviously murdering all these very prominent rich people who were very notably at a party at our suspicious devil murder house!”
Lestat is like, “Ok, I want to be Queen of Mardi Gras!”
So, they spend much of the episode planning their big bonanza bloodbath ball. Which involves—jeezus fucking christ—bribing the last of those awful boring Business Moustaches (who has shaved his moustache!!!) to make Lestat the Mardi Gras queen?
Meanwhile, Claudia is doing Step 2 of her plan: buy poison to poison one of Lestat’s victims to death so that he also will die due to the very clear and understandable rules about “dead blood.”
Also, in Present Day, Daniel is distracted by Rashid conspicuously enjoying a little sunshine out on the lanai, so he can’t possibly secretly be a vampire right???
Next, it is finally Mardi Gras, and Lestat gets to do drag on a big float:
So, he’s having a blast. Their ball is a huge success, and all the important people are there, which is great because part of the plan is convince all the…worst society people to stick around for the after party, where they will supposedly learn the secret of eternal youth or something. Claudia has even earmarked some hot twins for Lestat—but, she telepathically tells Louis, really she’s going to poison one of them (see above re: dead blood, ugh).
While all this is happening, Louis thinks he telepathologically hears another vampire at the party. But Claudia is like, “What? Shut up, you’re just hungry.” Oh, because they’ve been starving themselves all week to prepare for eating so many people.
In addition to being v. hungry, Louis is also super horny for Lestat again all of a sudden, and they have a nice sweet chat on the terrace. Then they have a big romantic dance together and kiss right in front of everyone. They’re like, “Yes! We are super gay just like you all already thought!”
So, now Louis is having second thoughts about killing this guy he’s kinda in love with. But Claudia is like, “Snap the fuck out of it!” So he does, becaue pretty much the poor dope has no mind of his own.
Later, at the super selective exclusive after party, they gather all these dummies, including the hot twins and Shaved Business Moustache, around a big punch bowl, and Lestat is like, “Here it is! The Magickal Elyxiyr of Lyfe!”
But SURPRISE! The punch bowl is empty, and our lovable trio of vampires start murdering everyone! It is a full-on chaotic bloodbath, and they just get blood all over their conveniently white costumes, which, if I know anything about Anne Rice, is 100% against basic vampire etiquette.
Everything is going according to Claudia’s plan! She’s got the poisoned twin all ready for Lestat to chow down, when suddenly an uninvited guest strolls in! It’s Lestat’s mistress Antoinette (a.k.a. Floozica!) all done up like Marlene Dietrich and she’s a vampire now. TWIST! It turns out, she’s been spying on Louis and Claudia all along and told Lestat all about their plan to have him drink the poisoned twin’s dead blood.
Everyone starts hissing at each other and Antoinette forces Claudia to drink the hot twin’s blood instead.
But DOUBLE TWIST! The twin is alive! And Lestat starts barfing up blood! Turns out, Claudia knew about Antoinette, which is why she couldn’t tell Louis the whole plan! It was a bait and switch, and really she poisoned Shaved Business Moustache because she knew Lestat would murder him first! (I mean, never mind that Shaved Business Moustache at no point ever seemed at all dead when Lestat bit him, but WHATEVER! NONE OF THE DEAD BLOOD STUFF MAKES SENSE! WHO CARES!)
Claudia impales Antoinette with a fire poker and stomps her face in, then leave Louis alone with Lestat to say goodbye.
Lestat is like, “BLLLLAAAGGGHHH, nooooooo! I love you thooooooo!” But Louis just holds him tragically and slits his throat.
Then Louis and Claudia get to work burning all the bodies, including poor dumb Antoinette, who is fully still alive and screaming. R.I.P. Antoinette, you silly, ultimately very stylish floozy!
But what to do with Lestat’s dead gorgeous bod tho? Surely, they must burn it also, right? Why no! Hahaha! Why would they need to do that? He drank DEAD BLOOD, duh! So, he’s definitely fully 100% for real dead, obviously, no need to take further precautions! Haven’t you been paying attention to the very explicit and understandable rules about drinking DEAD BLOOD??? So, they just put him in a trunk and leave him on the curb for trash pick up, and head off to Europe.
LOL. Yeah, none of that makes any sense to Daniel either. In Present Day, he’s like, “Wait wait wait, there are all these pages missing from Claudia’s diary about this…” See, Daniel thinks that Louis didn’t burn Lestat on purpose. He knew that Lestat would be still alive and able to eat rats at the trash dump, and Claudia was all mad about it and that’s why those pages are missing.
At this point Rashid gets all upset and tries to end the interview. But Daniel just lays into Rashid, questioning him about Islam—I guess he doesn’t believe he’s really Muslim or something?—and why he was totally fine after Louis sucked his blood at dinner that one time. Then he starts in on Louis about how he chose Lestat over Claudia and how he needs a ton of therapy (which, yes, he does!), and how he’s not being honest about this story blah blah blah.
Meanwhile, Rashid is like “Enough with this prick!” and takes off his gloves and his contact lenses and floats up into the air. TWIST THE THIRD! Rashid was a vampire the whole time!
“But but but, you were in the sun!” Daniel blubbers.
Rashid: “I’m 514 years old, dude! The sun ain’t shit to me! BWAHAHAHAHA!”
He tosses Daniel a folder of olde timey programs from the Theatre des Vampires, and Louis, a dude who has historically terrible taste in boyfriends, is like, “This the Vampire Armand, the love of my life.”
END OF SHOW!
Ok, but so, what do we think of that…cliffhanger? I mean, I know all about this “Armand” character, but if you’re like, “Whaaaa? Whooooo?” then read this other thing I published all about the Vampire Chronicles’ certified demon twink. GAAAAAHHH! Can’t wait for Season 2!!!