Nandor & Gizmo 5ever: A Plea for 'What We Do in the Shadows'

If I have been a loudmouthed (or maybe florid-fingered) and demanding queer, it’s only because we queer folx are amazing, but the media made with us in mind is often less than we deserve. If I am adamant about this, it’s only because representation is important. You cannot be what you cannot see and queer people deserve to be seen. It’s a good thing What We Do in the Shadows is back with its rowdy immortal bloodsuckers, and they brought their sex positivity with them.

It’s long been an aspect of the vampire sitcom that our fine-fanged friends Laszlo, Nadja, Nandor, and the Guide have lived too long not to have gone a bit gay. The offhanded way they discuss this is quietly thrilling in a way that can be hard to explain. It’s not just that these vampires are fluid in their sexuality, it’s that they indulge their queerness in such a natural and easy way that it comes across as perfectly normal. They don’t remark upon it like it needs extra handling, explanation, or fanfare, and I can’t fully express how great that is to see. I wish less fantastical media would note how radical it is to present queerness as if it’s the most normal thing in the world (because it is). It’s not that hard to show love between humans outside the heterosexual. It’s the goal beyond goals, to have a society that doesn’t stratify and oppress each other by identity where there is nothing to be remarked upon in seeing a queer relationship. It may seem like I’m putting a lot of emphasis and weight on the characters of a vampire sitcom, but if that’s where queer representation is living then that’s where I’ll look.

Last season’s arc involved perennial peon Guillermo aka Gizmo coming out as gay and dating Freddie while he was in London. When this relationship inevitably collided with Gizmo’s life as a familiar, this led to a fascinating jealousy experienced by Gizmo’s master Nandor. Nandor became enamored with Freddie himself, leading to some magical cloning hijinks that concluded in the two Freddies entering into a relationship with each other. My thanks to whatever writer on staff is familiar with the concept of boyfriend twins. We also learned that like the other vampires, Nandor’s had a bit of everything, sexually speaking. In his misadventures with the genie resurrecting his many wives, we saw that some of his wives were men. That brings us to the new season of What We Do in the Shadows, which premiered July 13th on FX/Hulu with 2 new episodes. Spoilers abound on the other side of the Laszlo gif, so proceed warned.

Maybe it’s just me, but did these first two episodes seem queerer than usual? We’re revisiting the Gizmo/Nandor dynamic and from what we’ve seen so far, it looks like it’ll be the driving tension this season. After fumbling and bumbling with his vampire pal Derek, in the backroom of the minimart where Derek works, like a pair of baby-gays having a fole-ish first time, Guillermo is a vampire…ish. He survived the bite and drank Derek’s blood in return, but he can still go out in the sunlight and eat human food. He can’t fully turn into a bat, but he can give himself giant bat ears. Guillermo says he doesn’t feel “any sexier” but hey, he doesn’t need his glasses anymore, so that’s something. It’s unclear as of yet why his transformation seems to be taking so long (my theory/prediction: his vampire-hunter blood is interacting strangely with the vampirism), but Guillermo soon learns that may be for the better. While sitting through a birthday dinner at a restaurant where Colin Robinson now feeds as a waiter, our Gizmo learns that he might be in some trouble. When a familiar belonging to one vampire goes to a different vampire to be turned, the familiar’s master would have to kill them and themselves to escape the humiliation. This of course puts Guillermo in a tough spot and he scrambles to find a way to undo his vampirism if possible. Not only is he understandably afraid of dying, but you get the sense he’s upset to have “betrayed” Nandor in this way. When Guillermo says he might not have been ready to be turned after all, it almost feels like his unspoken thought is, “I should’ve waited for Nandor.”

Look, it’s not much labor to swap “vampirism” for “sex” and see this as a sort of askance coming out story. Vampirism has been used since its fictional inception as a stand-in for temptation, repressed desires, and uninhibited sexuality. It’s not a stretch to see a queer subtext here. Another Taika Waititi-produced comedy series Our Flag Means Death is similarly absurdist in tone, but much much more overt in its queerness. I’m not saying this means both shows will do the same things, but they’ve carried similar tones and chill approaches to sexuality. It doesn’t feel outside the realm of possibility to make this plea: please, What We Do in the Shadows, get Nandor and Gizmo together.

The table could not be more set. We’ve seen Nandor get unaccountably jealous when Guillermo is with someone else. They already bicker like a couple. I know the show is a goofy romp about the vampires of Staten Island, but Our Flag Means Death has set the precedent that a Waititi show can be super queer and still have a silly fun time. Beat The Righteous Gemstones (another show with an ambiguously queer pairing in Kelvin and Keefe) to the punch as a beloved absurdist comedy. Let What We Do in the Shadows do what so many other shows merely gesture at and give us Nandor/Gizmo.

This piece was written during the 2023 WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes. Without the labor of the writers and actors currently on strike, the series being covered here wouldn’t exist.