Sheila Atim as Akasha in The Vampire Lestat
AMC
Interview with the Vampire (IWTV) has been renewed for a fourth season, and fans are in for another name change and a new showrunner. Season 4 will be called Queen of the Damned in a nod to Anne Rice’s third book in the Vampire Chronicles series. The tale is Akasha’s (Sheila Atim) story. As such, showrunner Rolin Jones is stepping down and executive producer Hannah Moscovitch is rising to the role. Jones will remain an EP on the AMC series as will Mark Johnson.
Moscovitch’s promotion comes as the franchise turns its focus to a female protagonist. This is a change for the series, which has been dominated by the perspective of men since its start with exception to Claudia’s (Delainey Hayles) diary entries. Now it’s a woman’s turn to both live through and inflict the horrors.
In the teaser shared below, Akasha calls to the women of the world to rise up. Her brand of empowerment isn’t civil or collaborative. She has no interest in equal partnership between genders. Akasha wants the slaughter of all men, as she believes it is what women have longed to do.
Who is Akasha in ‘IWTV’?
The TV adaptation introduced Akasha in The Vampire Lestat, giving viewers a glimpse into the slumbering queen’s time in Lestat’s (Sam Reid) care as a keeper. She liked him immediately, having sent Marius (Christopher Heyerdahl) to fetch Lestat from his self-made grave in the aftermath of Nikki’s (Joseph Potter) death and Gabriella’s (Jennifer Ehle) abandonment.
However, their whimsy over the pronunciation of the word ‘scoop’ gave way to Akasha’s hunger on New Year’s Eve the night Lestat painted her lips with his blood. She woke and forcibly fed from him before making him drink from her. The nightmare-ish experience gave Lestat a power he could not control.
For Akasha, the incident opened the floodgates of her memory as she sped through her time alive and as the mother of vampires until she landed on one certain truth, she is the answer to everything. Atim’s chilling and powerful performance in episode 5, “New York,” set the tone for what fans can expect from Akasha in the coming season.
Sam Reid as Lestat de Lioncourt and Sheila Atim as Akasha in The Vampire Lestat
Sophie Giraud/AMC
How ‘The Vampire Lestat’ Sets Up ‘IWTV’s ‘Queen Of The Damned’
After harrowing individual experiences post-beheading, Lestat and Louis (Jacob Anderson) reunite on The Vampire Lestat’s tour bus. 45,000 vampires and 10,000 beautifully unwell humans have descended on the venue where the band are supposed to perform a concert in the forest.
However, Lestat refuses to go onstage. He’d previously agreed to the event to satisfy Gabriella’s preoccupation with the Great Conversion, the movement to make more vampires and overrun humanity. It was never an agenda Lestat personally ascribed to and his near death experience, and realization of Louis’ love, finally gave him the ability to push back on Gabriella’s control over his life.
Lestat called his mother a monster because of her abuse of him throughout his existence from their days as humans to their present as vampires. The finale includes a jump to the near future where Lestat is recording The Failures, his account of how Akasha’s rise came to be and how he’s responsible for the destruction he gives the audience a look at when he opens the door to his Montreal home.
The Vampire Lestat ends before the concert that awakens Akasha, but it’s on the horizon and her reign will be explored in Interview with the Vampire season 4.
Watch the teaser for Queen of the Damned:
All seven episodes of The Vampire Lestat are available to stream on AMC+. Follow Sabrina Reed on Forbes for more coverage of IWTV and news about the business of TV.
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