Find your recorder — Anne Rice’s Interview with the Vampire Season 2 has crept onto Netflix. You can now devour the horror drama’s eight-episode sophomore season.

Interview with the Vampire initially premiered in October 2022, raising the curtain for a new take on author Anne Rice’s novel characters Louis de Pointe du Lac (Game of Thrones’ Jacob Anderson) and his vampire companion Lestat de Lioncourt (Sam Reid). Their supernatural love story — and the ensuing globe-spanning drama that it creates — beckons viewers on a spellbinding journey that spans more than a century. There will be blood, but also swoons and heartbreak, as Louis learns immortality is rarely a salve for life’s great problems. More often than not, it only creates greater monsters. 

Whether you’re well initiated into the Vampire coven, or just curious about joining this fang fam, you’ve probably got a few questions — just like interviewer Daniel Molloy (Reptile’s Eric Bogosian). So keep reading to satiate your thirst about all things Interview with the Vampire, from details on its plot and cast to a recap of how Season 1 ended.

What happens in Interview with the Vampire?  

The horror of life, death, love, and the concept of eternity (with a dash of theatrical camp) — like most vampire-based fiction. At least, technically. 

But, if you’re wondering what happens in Interview with the Vampire, that all comes down to the title. The series centers on the titular interview between aging journalist Daniel and his subject, Louis, a nearly 150-year-old vampire. The two previously did an unpublished interview about 50 years prior in San Francisco, and Louis now wants to set the record straight.   

The result is a time-jumping tale of how a Creole brothel owner in turn-of-the-20th-century New Orleans became a Dubai-living blood-sipper. Starting in 1910, we follow Louis as he falls in love with his vampiric maker, Lestat. The pair share a complicated, unforgettable romance that spans several decades — not to mention, shades of morality. 

In Interview with the Vampire Season 2, Louis and vampire fledgling Claudia (Delainey Hayles, taking over the role from Bailey Bass) travel to Europe on a desperate quest for supernatural answers. Their hunt for other vampires brings them to 1940s Paris and the seductive — if dangerous — Théâtre des Vampires. Although exciting ideas, tantalizing romances, and captivating artistry tempt Louis and Claudia, deadly secrets wait in the shadows of this cavernous theater. The choices made in the City of Lights will burn throughout the endless years of these immortals’ lives.   

Alfonso Bresciani/AMC

What is Interview with the Vampire based on? 

If this is all sounding familiar, there’s a reason for that — and it’s not that some undead being has been toying with your memories (they would never do that!). Interview with the Vampire the TV show, created by playwright Rolin Jones, is inspired by Anne Rice’s 1976 novel of the same name. It also has roots in Rice’s wider Vampire Chronicles book series. These same literary influences were the basis for 1994’s BAFTA-nominated, velvet-heavy film Interview with the Vampire, starring Brad Pitt, Tom Cruise, Christian Slater, and The Power of the Dog’s Kirsten Dunst. 

However, Jones and team have made some important changes from these previous incarnations. In the series, Louis is no longer a white 1790s enslaver. Instead, he is a 1910s Black businessman. And the queer subtext of Interview — and many vampire stories — becomes text, as Louis and Lestat are the core couple of Season 1; Season 2 then offers its own compelling queer love stories. However, you’ll have to watch Interview with the Vampire to find out what other updates lurk in its savage heart. 

When does Interview with the Vampire premiere on Netflix?

Interview with the Vampire Season 1 and Season 2 are both now streaming, as part of a curated selection of AMC series available on Netflix. 

Who’s in the Interview with the Vampire cast? 

The main Interview with the Vampire cast is as follows: 

• Jacob Anderson as Louis de Pointe du Lac, a dubious vampire who is skeptical about the constraints of immortality
• Sam Reid as Lestat de Lioncourt, a romantic older vampire with a flair for the dramatic (and gruesome violence)
• Bailey Bass as Claudia, a young teen-turned-vampire who struggles with the existential dread of remaining in a child’s body for eternity; Delainey Hayles was recast as Claudia for Interview With the Vampire Season 2.
• Eric Bogosian as Daniel Molloy, an ailing renowned journalist who shares a murky history with Louis
• Assad Zaman as Rashid, one of Louis’ servants, who is much more than meets the eye. For the truth about “Rashid” — which is explored in-depth in Season 2 — keep reading. 

Are there other Anne Rice’s Immortal Universe shows on Netflix? 

You’re in luck, creatures of the night. You can remain in the thrall of Rice’s gothic world with Mayfair Witches, a supernatural drama that uncovers the cursed lineage of its titular New Orleans family. Season 2 of Mayfair Witches — led by Alexandra Daddario and based on Rice’s book series — is now on Netflix. 

How does Interview with the Vampire Season 1 end? 

The Interview with the Vampire Season 1 finale centers around the attempted murder of Lestat at the hands of Louis and Claudia. Much of Episide 7 takes place at the vampire clan’s grand farewell party to New Orleans in 1939. After a few decades living at the Rue Royale mansion, suspicions have hit a fever pitch in town, and Lestat — who knows how quickly popularity can transform into pitchforks for the supernatural — decides it’s time to flee to Buenos Aires. Louis and Claudia go along with the plan for appearances. In reality, Claudia, exhausted by Lestat’s controlling and abusive nature, figures out how to finally kill her sire. And she decides to do it at the party. 

But a few swoony interactions between Lestat and Louis at the soirée suggest the pitfalls of Claudia’s scheme. As Lestat’s demise becomes imminent, Louis is overwhelmed by his all-encompassing passion for Lestat. Their almost 30 years of undeniable (if tragic) love culminates in an attention-grabbing dance around the ballroom that confirms the couple’s romantic relationship to all of New Orleans high society. Is Louis truly ready to kill his maker? His murderer? The love of his life? 

Claudia, on the other hand, does not suffer these agonizing questions when it’s time to end Lestat. She realizes that Lestat turned his lover Antoinette (Maura Grace Athari) into a vampire and had been using the new fledgling to spy on Claudia and Louis. So Claudia telepathically broadcast incorrect information to Louis, knowing Antoinette would hear it and share with Lestat. Just as Lestat believes he has thwarted Claudia once and for all, he learns the truth: She has already drugged him with poisoned blood. There’s no escaping this situation — particularly because Claudia brutally incapacitates Antoinette (and later burns her body). 

Louis and Lestat finally accept the unavoidable truth of the moment. Lestat offers one last confession of love and a devastated Louis slits his partner’s throat. Unable to burn his body with the rest of the night’s many victims, Louis wraps Lestat in a carpet and leaves him in a heap of garbage. Louis and Claudia then drive off to the port and board the ship they supposedly purchased for the villainous Tom Anderson (Chris Stack). The vessell — headed to Europe instead of South America — was actually always part of their getaway. 

Daniel, now a hardened journalist, points out the flaws in Louis’s story. While he claims to have “murdered” Lestat, Louis did nothing to permanently end his ex’s undead life. There was no beheading or burning. In fact, Louis sent Lestat to the dump, which is filled with rats — and rats are filled with blood. Louis ultimately spared Lestat, much to Claudia’s displeasure. 

As these final long-held secrets spill out, Louis’ servant “Rashid” is pushed to reveal his own truth: He is, in fact, the vampire Armand, a 514-year-old immortal and the real “love of Louis’s life.” Armand was even a witness on that fateful night in San Francisco so many years prior, when Louis and Daniel had their first interview. 

So how did Louis and Armand meet? Where is Claudia? What happened in California? What does it mean that Lestat may still be alive? Find out the answers to all those chilling mysteries — and many more — by pressing play on Interview with the Vampire Season 2 right now. 

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