Ok, so a love story Vladimir is not. That much has become clear! If, like us, you've already binged your way through all eight episodes of Netflix's daring, psychosexual academic thriller, you probably have a few questions. Namely, what was going on with that ending?
If, like Rachel Weisz's unnamed protagonist, you spent most of the series lusting after Leo Woodhall's smirking Vladimir and his dainty little chain necklace, you may have expected the show to end with — you know, some very satisfying sexy times in the cabin.
Things didn't exactly go that way, did they? And perhaps that's kind of the point. After all, this show, and Julia May Jonas' book upon which it is based, is all about dark, unrequited desires and power dynamics as told by an unreliable narrator who largely lives inside her own imaginative head. It has a lot more in common with the Gothic romantic literature like Jane Eyre than a fun, sexy TV romp like Rivals.
Indeed, the show is filled with literary references to novels about dangerous obsessions that can help us understand the show's ending. There's Daphne du Maurier's Rebecca, which Weisz's character teaches to her students, about another unnamed narrator who develops an all-consuming obsession with her mysterious older husband's dead wife, Rebecca. There's also the aforementioned Charlotte Brontë's Jane Eyre, another story about a mousy protagonist whose relationship with gruff older Mr. Rochester is literally haunted by (spoiler) his ‘mad’ secret wife who he keeps in the attic. And then there's Vladimir (yes, Vladimir) Nabokov's Lolita, which sees an unnamed narrator lusting after a child. But more on all of this later.
First of all, what happened in that Vladimir finale? And what does it mean?
Justice for real middle-aged bodies.
A trip to the cabin
After months of sexual fantasising about Vlad, Weisz's character finally takes some action. She invites Vlad for lunch and ends up convincing him to come with her to her secluded cabin in the woods. For an afternoon writing retreat, she says. Sure. While we might have all hoped this would go the Heated Rivalry cottage route, it quickly became a lot more Cabin in the Woods.
Before long, the protagonist has slipped a little muscle relaxer into Vlad's whisky. When the half-conscious Vlad tries to stumble away, our protagonist takes her chance and chains him up to an old wooden chair, before calmly returning to her manuscript — which, by the way, is basically fan fiction of her Vlad-inspired fantasies.
A happy ending?
But it's twist upon twist in Vladimir, and when Vlad comes to, he confesses that, actually, he's not not into this whole getting-chained-up thing. In fact, his manuscript is also about his fantasies — in this case, fantasies about a young man who has a meaningful, intellectual, tender affair with his older mentor. How sweet.
Here comes John
The arrival of John Slattery's John, aka Rachel Weisz's husband, complicates things a bit. John brings everything slamming back to reality, and the cabin quickly loses its sexy lustre. John's patronising congratulatory tone doesn't help.
Things escalate when John reveals that he never actually slept with Vlad's wife, Cynthia (Jessica Henwick) — instead, they were just writing and doing drugs. But for Vlad, this might be even worse as Cynthia is a recovering addict. He launches at John and lands a punch.
The steamy new Netflix show Vladimir includes lots of famous faces.
Soon enough, things simmer down, and Vlad falls asleep in the guest room. John and Weisz's character, meanwhile, wrap up things with the pesky sexual allegations trial — it seems John will keep his pension.
Up in flames… literally
Another twist. In the middle of the night, the cabin goes up in flames. While the two men struggle with the jammed backdoor, Weisz's character tosses them both a look before grabbing her unfinished manuscript on legal pads and dashing out of the cabin just in time.
And that seems to be that. In the final moments, she stands outside the cabin, seemingly uninterested in helping to open the door or call for help.
It's an ambiguous ending, though. She turns to the camera and wryly informs us that the two men do actually live. Vladimir does publish his book. Everyone lives happily ever after. “Or maybe not,” she adds with a sinister wink.
What are we to make of this? Maybe they do live. Or maybe, her fantasy of them as described on the legal pads, is what lives on. Or maybe, the fire only happens in her book. Either way, we need to interpret it all with a real grain of salt, as Weisz's character is a classic case of an unreliable narrator.
The fire of it all fits nicely with those gothic references I mentioned earlier. Rebecca ends with the housekeeper (also obsessed with the dead Rebecca) setting the house alight. Luckily, the protagonist and her husband aren't home at the time. In Jane Eyre, the mad wife starts the fire. Mr. Rochester is left blinded and scarred. (I can't help but think that, based on these stories, Weisz's character just might have started the fire herself.)
In both novels, the couples disappear off to live more peacefully away from the places where the doomed obsessions first began.
How is the show's ending different to the book?
In May Jonas' book, the fire is a little different. Vlad returns to find the protagonist and John trapped in the burning cabin and pulls them out. They are left scarred and live on quietly together as their academic careers fall apart. You know, à la Rebecca and Jane Eyre.
What's next?
Is there more to come from Weisz's protagonist? If Vlad and John did live, will we see them again? Although May Jonas' book is a standalone story, it's certainly possible that Netflix will commission a season 2 — especially considering how ambiguous that ending was. Who knows, perhaps the prof and her protegé will meet again and go for a round two.
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