I mean, come on! You know it would’ve been rather tacky (with a touch of telenovela) for Lestat de Lioncourt to simply march into Louis’ Dubai penthouse and tell his side of the story. And where’s the “theater” in that anyway? Lestat’s rendition demanded extravagance, a star-struck audience, and for Louis to keep mum. And in this week’s episode of Interview with the Vampire, that’s exactly what Lestat is granted. Wouldn’t you think it was fair, given that Louis had the stage all to himself when it was his turn?
Spoiler Alert
What’s the trial about?
To be bundled in a sack and kicked around by the coven members wasn’t where Louis saw his move to Paris leading. And once a vampiress who’d been dumping despairing mortals into the box of rats, Claudia was now trapped in the same box, and Louis couldn’t move a finger to help her. The combined efforts of the coven disoriented their minds on stage as the jackal-like audience eagerly awaited the first blood drawn. Claudia, Louis, and Madeleine’s fate now resided in the hands of the audience, who thought all they were seeing was make-believe. And where’s the crime in that? Lestat proved to be a rather untamable beast on the stage, though. There’s no binding him to a script. Santiago and Sam should’ve known better. And now that it was his time in the spotlight, serving as the witness in the trial for his own attempted murder and the plethora of other crimes pinned on the trio, we finally hear Lestat’s version. Although Louis continues to refute it at present, Lestat’s story certainly had a different perspective on what went down. Apparently, Louis had been the one to call out to Lestat’s very soul. And in between all this “who came on to whom” fiasco, Lestat reveals a rather vulnerable truth about vampiric existence. There’s no pain more severe and no threat so terrifying to a vampire as that of loneliness. And if we’re to believe Lestat, it was the fear of loneliness that Louis held over him.
What was the truth about Claudia’s turning?
The most overwhelming and sometimes even exasperating thing about watching Interview with the Vampire has to be the fact that not one of the vampire protagonists is especially honest. So it’s practically a treat to hear a version of the story that actually kind of checks out. We now have Lestat claiming that he had, in fact, been a goody-two-shoes, reminding Louis that turning a 14-year-old would go against the Great Laws. Lestat seemed to have had the foresight to know that Claudia would become a volatile mix of teenage internal chaos and all the rage that comes with the dark gift. Vampirism would be much more of a curse than a gift to the charred girl on the brink of death. And even though in the present timeline, Louis corroborates this version, I think we could’ve come to an assessment without his backing. In Lestat’s story, Louis was moved to have been called an angel by Claudia. And if you remember Louis’ most significant conflict with vampirism in the early days—how he lost his touch with humanity and ended up a beast he loathed—you’d understand why being a savior would be so important to Louis. He needed to be seen through the eyes of someone who saw the goodness that he’d lost along the way. And Claudia would’ve given him exactly that.
Why does Lestat break the script?
A round of applause for Santiago for even thinking that Lestat could be chained to a script. He’s never been anyone’s puppet. And with Armand watching the trial unfold from the box he’s confined to, Lestat has not one but two of his past romances held captive at the Théâtre des Vampires. So there’s an emotional whirlwind going on inside him. And when it comes to reminiscing about the night Claudia came to whisk Louis away, Lestat falls back into his old patterns of manipulation. He paints himself as the wise, responsible one until he reaches the climactic “Cloud Gift” moment, the one where he shoots himself into the sky, holding Louis in his arms, and drops him. What you must keep in mind is the fact that Lestat doesn’t want Louis to know that he’s lying, even though there’s a distinct possibility that this is Louis’ last day alive. Even in death, he doesn’t want Louis to break out of the cage forged by his love. So to Santiago’s dismay, guilt is all there is to hear in Lestat’s recollection of the night he dropped Louis from the sky. But even under the layers of manipulation he intends for it to come with, the confession is aching with a genuine sense of remorse. He broke Louis because he couldn’t get him to love him.
Is Claudia dead?
Under the defensive cloak of bitterness, Claudia’s default has always been being protective of Louis. I’m not saying that Louis doesn’t love Claudia. And arguably, maybe it’s an even purer love, considering love wasn’t why he insisted on her turning. But Louis has always been more of a romantic love vampire. And seeing the change on his face after Lestat’s apology must’ve been more painful for Claudia than standing up on sliced tendons. But there she was, protecting him again against her better judgment. And when the time came for the sentencing, death being the only alternative to acquittal, the audience regurgitated the hatred that’d accumulated, thinking it had no real consequences. But the trial was anything but fake. And the preparation was nothing short of masterful.
The depraved bags of blood in the audience screamed death for Claudia and her freshly turned companion, Madeleine. As if she hadn’t proved her love for Claudia already, Madeleine practically chose death when she was given the option to leave Claudia and join the coven. Lovers in death, Claudia and Madeleine turned to ashes to the gasps of the charmed audience. In the 6th episode, we heard of the coven’s petty crime of stealing an observatory lens. And the purpose of that odd theft is clarified when that same lens is used to reflect the sunlight and kill Claudia and Madeleine.
Now, I’m not entirely sure if Armand’s telling the truth in the ending sequence of this week’s Interview with the Vampire. But he claims to have only gathered enough strength to grab the audience’s attention and make them say “banishment” instead of “death” when it was Louis’ turn to be sentenced by the faux jury. Was he actually unable to pull that off when it was Claudia’s turn? Or was he glad to do away with the only other attachment Louis had in his life? But the banishment a grumbling Santiago had in mind for Louis was only a lingering, more excruciating death. He was trapped in a coffin, buried in chips of stone, and shoved inside the crypt that held the remains of the law-breaking vamps through the centuries. He was sentenced to death by starvation. And the loneliness that came with it was only an added bonus for the hateful coven. But you ask me, I’m wary of making up my mind about what actually happened to Claudia just yet. After all, Louis wasn’t there when Claudia supposedly burned to death. And who’s to say that Armand hasn’t made it up just to detach the two?
What can we expect from the season finale?
The sneak peek into the finale of Interview with the Vampire season 2 sees Louis’ resurrection from the coffin. But it would’ve been impossible for him to have done it without someone’s help. And Armand is the most plausible vampire to have revived a near-dead Louis with his blood. We also see Louis’ grief over Claudia’s death ignite his pyrokinetic powers. So it’s entirely possible that in the season finale, we’ll find out that it was Louis who burned down the Théâtre des Vampires. There’s a shot where Louis threatens Lestat with death. But even with Louis’ newly found pyrokinetic abilities, I doubt that Lestat will be an easy vampire to kill. Santiago better watch his back, though. Louis is likely to go after him first in the finale of the second season of Interview with the Vampire.
