San Diego Comic-Con attendees helped kick off the farewell tour of FX’s What We Do in the Shadows with a full Hall H panel on Thursday, July 25th. Attendees were the first to see the sixth and final season’s premiere episode, which will air on October 21st. The screening was followed by a panel discussion featuring Paul Sims (Writer/Executive Producer), Matt Berry (Laszlo), Mark Proksch (Colin Robinson), Kristen Schaal (The Guide), Kyle Newacheck (Producer/Director), and joining virtually and still in character, Kayvan Novak (Nandor).
(FX)
Let’s start this panel recap with news about Season 6. First, the premiere episode introduces Jerry (played by SNL alumn Mike O'Brien), who was once the fifth member of the vampire gang alongside Nandor, Laszlo, Nadja, and Colin Robinson. Moderator Eric Goldman tried to get more information about how many episodes Jerry is expected to stick around. “What happens with the fifth Beatle?” proposed Kyle Newacheck, answering the question with a question.
Jerry returns to his Staten Island coven to find that his friends have gone soft on humans. With The Guide having been similarly tempered, Kristen Schaal explained how Jerry’s arrival shakes things up for her character. “She's just looking for a good, strong leader to move the vampire population in the right direction, and she's found it in Jerry,” Schaal said. “There's no way that she could be wrong.”
With a true, bloodthirsty vampire back in the fold, Jerry instantly has questions about the human documentary crew that have been allowed to film all of the happenings over the past five seasons. “Coming from The Office (that was my first role), [I was] used to filming in a mockumentary style,” shared Mark Proksch about the show’s format. “It feels natural to me having them be around. This season, we highlight the idea that it's a documentary in a really interesting and fun way, which caters to comedy so much better.”
“There's definitely a dynamic that gets opened up towards the later end of the season in a very meta way, which was fun to make,” added Kyle Newacheck. “It's a question we always ask ourselves: what does the documentary crew know, and how much do we know about them? I will say that I got to play a director in the show while I was directing the show, which was the most meta thing I've ever been a part of. It was an absolute blast, so stay tuned—it's going to get wild and weird.”
Matt Berry is a multihyphenate comedian, actor, and musician. During the audience Q&A portion of the panel, a fan asked if we could expect any new songs from him, as Laszlo, this season. “There's an episode theme tune sort of mash-up,” Matt Berry answered, revealing that he will perform his own rendition of "You're Dead" by Norma Tanega. “You'll hear Matt sing in a way you’ve never heard before,” Paul Simms promised.
Nandor’s familiar, Guillermo (played by Harvey Guillén), spent much of the series trying to become a vampire. Paul Sims once thought that Guillermo joining the undead would be the end of the series. But last season, he decided to flip the script, allowing Guillermo to get his wish, only to be dissatisfied with it. “A lot of this upcoming season is about Guillermo trying to move past this life that he's led and be his own person; Move out into the real world and get a real job of his own,” Paul Sims revealed. “Unfortunately for him, the rest of the vampires follow him to help him out because they're worried about him. So, imagine if you started a new job and your mom and dad showed up just to make sure you were doing okay. That's what the next season is like.”
Also missing from the panel was Natasia Demetriou, who plays the dual role of Nadja and Nadja’s human soul trapped in the body of a doll. There wasn’t much to glean about her character from the panel, save for the fact that Jerry’s return reminds Nadja and Laszlo about a fight they had long forgotten about, causing another rift between them. “This is the start of, I would say, their largest-ever argument,” Matt Berry explained. “You'll see them not wanting to spend much time together, but it doesn't last. It's all fine. They get back, and they're as horny as they ever were.”
Beyond that, the sixth and final season of FX’s What We Do in the Shadows promises more guest stars, more hilarious moments, and possibly the return of Laszlo’s fan-favorite alias. “I said we would never do it again after the first time,” Paul Sims shared. “Who knows what might happen?”
As a parting gift, attendees were given a ticket to redeem for an event exclusive t-shirt. With the panel billed as the “Farewell Tour,” the back of the shirt contains dates and locations of the cast’s previous panel appearances. The shirt hints that the show will be doing a panel at New York Comic-Con, scheduled for October 17th through 20th.
I guess we’ll just have to wait and see. Season 6 of What We Do in the Shadows premieres Monday, October 21st, on FX, with episodes streaming the next day on Hulu.