The Vampire Lestat got its biggest presence at San Diego Comic-Con yet with a Hall H panel, as well as the announcement that fans will be getting a fourth season.

AMC revealed in today’s panel that fans can look forward to an adaptation next season of Queen of the Damned, which will officially carry the title of the next novel in the Anne Rice The Vampire Chronicles series. The announcement capped the show’s first-ever Hall H panel, featuring executive producers Mark Johnson and Hannah Moscovitch alongside cast members Jacob Anderson, Assad Zaman, Eric Bogosian, and Sheila Atim.

Much of the discussion centered on the final two episodes of season three, which reunited Louis and Lestat before delivering one of the show’s most shocking twists.

“I didn’t know anything,” Johnson joked when asked how the episode reached its climactic ending. “I was led by Rolin Jones and Hannah Moscovitch down that weird road. Who takes a penultimate episode and decapitates the two leads? It’s unheard of.”

For Moscovitch, however, those moments had been part of the plan from early in the writing process.

“We knew fairly early on that we were going to do that,” she said. “We wanted episode six to reunite Louis and Lestat, and for us to get to see their love again, which is at the very core of the show… and then wanted to cut their heads off.”

She explained that the finale was ultimately about forcing Lestat to confront the truths he’d buried for centuries.

“We wanted Lestat to have to face his own trauma and run through the different rooms and hallways of his mind until he understood that Gabriella had been abusing him and that Louis really loved him.”

Moscovitch also reflected on bringing Gabriella into the series this season, calling her one of the most rewarding characters to write.

“I love writing Gabriella’s introduction into the show because she gets such an astonishing one,” she said, also singling out one quieter moment as her favorite. “There’s a scene in episode four where she talks about how she isn’t a mother or a wife or a woman anymore. She’s a fever that comes in the night. That’s one of my favorite pieces of writing that we did.”

Jacob Anderson admitted the season finale also presented the biggest acting challenge of his career.

“That is the hardest thing I’ve ever done acting,” Anderson said of portraying a decapitated Louis. “How do you speak? How do you breathe? It was all about making things up.” He laughed while explaining the practical effects behind the sequence. “I was half suspended into a table… and I had this really lovely green crop top situation, which I enjoyed.”

One of the biggest laughs from Hall H came when Anderson was asked about filming Louis’ emotionally charged confrontations with Sam Reid. While the scenes appear devastating on screen, he said they’re some of the easiest days on set.

“The twisted thing about this show… you think a scene like that, where it’s screaming at each other and it’s intense and all the emotions are there, would be difficult,” Anderson said. “But weirdly, that’s the most comfortable I feel making this show.”

He continued, “Me and Sam screaming at each other… it feels comfortable to do that kind of thing.” Laughing, he summed up their working relationship as, “Whenever they’re screaming, just know they’re having a blast.”

Assad Zaman discussed finally getting to explore Armand’s more manipulative side after spending much of the previous seasons hiding his true intentions, and letting “Gremlin” Armand come out to play.

“It was very delicious,” Zaman said. “I’d always wanted to explore that side of Armand more expressively… Armand’s way more conniving and methodical.”

Later, when asked about aspects of his character that aren’t explicitly shown on screen, Zaman offered insight into who he thinks Armand is he’s alone with himself. “He’s the specific alien-quality when you’re in statis, you’re almost on standby, like statusesque. You’re kind of unable to evoke or to think anything because everything you do is shaped by either being obsessed with someone, manipulating someone, or trying to survive your trauma,” he said. “What do those people do when they’re not being observed?” 

Drawing inspiration from Anne Rice’s novels, he imagined Armand almost shutting down when left alone.

“I see it more as like an alien that’s unable to understand himself, that’s only able to play a part,” Zaman explained. “So when there’s no one to see them, they kind of can just go a little bit dead. Dead soldier kind of thing.”

Devil’s Minion — the relationship of Armand and Daniel — wasn’t really covered, but Assad did joke about the romance being “on and off screen” between Daniel and Armand.

 

Sheila Atim, who made a commanding impression as Akasha in the season finale, discussed preparing for the character’s unforgettable monologue.

“Hannah had written an impeccable speech,” Atim said. “I just had to do my job. I had to learn it.” She revealed that the speech originally ran four pages without a single full stop, requiring her to carefully chart its emotional progression before filming. “It was really about trying to chart the journey through the questions that Akasha is answering… and then stepping in there and taking on all the wonderful work that the other departments had done.”

Preparing for the scene meant more than simply memorizing the dialogue. Atim revealed that she paced around her hotel room while learning the speech before realizing she’d be delivering it while strapped to a stone table, and that production had limited time, so she wanted to show up as prepared as possible. “So I decided to learn it sitting on my bed with one leg up and one leg down in the exact position I would be,” she said.

The effort paid off. “When Sheila gave her speech, everyone on set clapped,” Moscovitch recalled. “I’d never seen that.”

Anne Rice’s Queen of the Damned is officially on the way, with Akasha poised to take center stage after her chilling arrival in the season finale.