Warning: the following contains SPOILERS for What We Do In The Shadows.
What We Do In The Shadows season 3 reveals much about its strange and silly vampires. The roots of What We Do In The Shadows can be traced back to a live stand-up comedy bit by Taika Waititi and Jemaine Clement, in which a vampire comedian gets heckled by another vampire. This concept later snowballed into the 2014 movie What We Do In The Shadows, which was the inspiration for the ongoing FX series of the same name. Today, What We Do In The Shadows continues to shift how mainstream audiences perceive vampires and the supernatural world.
What We Do In The Shadows digs from the same dark comedic vein as movies and shows like Dracula: Dead and Loving It, My Babysitter’s a Vampire, and Buffy the Vampire Slayer. While the vampires in these properties are depicted as powerful and lethal bloodsucking creatures, they’re also hilariously still attached to the habits and emotions of the humans that they detest. This formula will continue to evolve in What We Do In The Shadows season 4, along with the 3rd season’s revelations about its vampires.
Indeed, What We Do In The Shadows season 3 sheds more light on the mystery of what makes its vampires tick. These revelations were done through season 3’s guests stars, celebrity cameos, returning characters, and callbacks to earlier events. Let’s take a closer look at the details that unravel the true nature of What We Do In The Shadows’ undead kindred.
Vampire Blood Can Save Even Werewolves From True Death
In What We Do In The Shadows season 3, episode 3, “Gail,” Nandor reunites with his on-again-off-again girlfriend. It’s later revealed that Gail is actually a werewolf. Moreover, while Nandor wants a more serious relationship, Gail is content with just having casual fun with Nandor from time to time. This leads Nandor to try and impress Gail during a kickball game with the werewolves, in which What We Do In The Shadows parodies Twilight. Nadja accidentally kicks a ball to Gail’s head and instantly kills her. In response, Nandor makes Gail drink his blood in order to revive her, which then allows Gail to turn into a giant bat and fly away from Nandor. This is the first time for the show to confirm that vampire blood can save even werewolves from true and final death. Moreover, Gail is the only known werewolf-vampire hybrid in the show. And although she never appears again in season 3, Gail is potentially What We Do In The Shadows’ most powerful supernatural creature.
The Lives Of All Vampires Could Be Dependent On The Sire’s Survival
The Sire escapes its prison in What We Do In The Shadows season 3, episode 6, “The Escape.” The Sire, also known as the first vampire and the progenitor of all vampirekind, is What We Do In The Shadows’ version of the Master from Buffy the Vampire Slayer or the antediluvians from the Vampire: The Masquerade series. When the Sire escapes its chamber in the Vampiric Council, the vampires panic and reveal an old urban legend: vampires die when their sire is killed. Laszlo concludes that this is impossible since the Baron Afanas, who sired both Laszlo and Nadja, is dead. But when Colin and Laszlo dig up the Baron and find him alive, they realize that the legend could be real. For now, What We Do In The Shadows hasn’t confirmed whether or not vampires die with whoever sired them. But if it’s true, then the lives of the show’s main characters all depend on the survival of the Sire.
Vampire Limbs Don’t Regenerate Even After A Long Time
As “The Escape” also features the return of Baron Afanas, it also reveals another key characteristic of vampires: their limbs don’t regenerate at all. From the Baron’s return in episode 6 up to his appearance in the finale of What We Do In The Shadows season 3, the Baron still hasn’t regrown any parts of his body that were incinerated by sunlight. This shows that even ancient vampires can’t regrow lost limbs. On the other hand, the Baron actually surviving a sunlit death could infer that vampires get more resilient with time, and considering how no one seems overly concerned with the Baron getting mutilated, he could actually regrow some of his parts by the time season 4 comes around. Meanwhile, another possibility is that the show’s budget simply didn’t allow any further modifications to the Baron’s appearance. And since an ancient and powerful vampire having to be carried around by a hellhound is more hilarious than the Baron Afanas in his full horrific glory, What We Do In The Shadows decided to run with his current look.
Most Vampires Can Regenerate Their Fangs Overnight
In What We Do In The Shadows season 3, episode 8, “The Wellness Center,” a scam artist vampire named Jan reveals that even if vampires willingly pull out their fangs, they just grow back again the next day. Depressed by his unlife’s lack of meaning, Nandor seeks answers at the Post-Chiropteran Wellness Center, an eerie cult of “ex-vampires” that practice stereotypically human rituals in a facetious effort to regain their humanity. These rituals include musical aerobics, consuming mundane media, and pulling out their fangs, which they have to do everyday. Later, Guillermo pulls Nandor out of the cult against his will. Although the experience leaves both Nandor and Guillermo utterly distraught, “The Wellness Center” reveals that pulling out a vampire’s fangs is nothing more than a temporary inconvenience for the cursed kindred.
Energy Vampires Transform After 100 Years
What We Do In The Shadows season 3, episode 9, “A Farewell” shows the death of Colin Robinson on his 100th birthday. This confirms what Laszlo found in Edmund Wheelwright’s “Compendium Vampirium” regarding the limited lifespan of What We Do In The Shadows’ energy vampires. However, in What We Do In The Shadows season 3, episode 10, “The Portrait,” Laszlo goes to the basement to find out that Colin isn’t actually dead. Instead, Colin has transformed into a baby. This means that when Laszlo found the chapter about energy vampires in the book, he never checked under the headline “Known Lifespan of Energy Vampires is 100 Years,” which likely contains more details about Colin’s transformation. Moreover, it’s also not surprising that the “Compendium Vampirium’s” chapter about energy vampires annoyingly hides the important details under a clickbait headline.